(CNN) – President Donald Trump suggested Saturday night that Russian President Vladimir Putin might have directed a Russian lawyer who met with Trump campaign associates in 2016 to disclose ties to Moscow recently in order to sow chaos for him in retaliation for aggressive actions he has taken against Russia.
The Russian lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya, said in an NBC News interview that aired Friday that she is both a lawyer and “an informant” after newly surfaced emails indicated she once worked with Russia’s chief legal office in an attempt to thwart a request from the Justice Department.
At a rally in Michigan on Saturday, Trump said, “I guarantee you, I’m tougher on Russia. Nobody ever thought. In fact, have you heard about the lawyer? For a year, a woman lawyer, she was like, ‘Oh, I know nothing.’ … Now all of a sudden she supposedly is involved with government. You know why? If she did that, because Putin and the groups said, ‘you know this Trump is killing us. Why don’t you say that you’re involved with government so that we could go and make their life in the United States even more chaotic.’ Look at what’s happened. Look at how these politicians have fallen for this junk. Russian collusion. Give me a break.”
Veselnitskaya has previously denied having worked for the Russian government, and in a statement to the Senate Judiciary Committee last year she said that she “operate(s) independently of any governmental bodies.”
In June 2016, Veselnitskaya met at Trump Tower with Donald Trump Jr., then-campaign manager Paul Manafort, and Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, among others. Emails released by Trump Jr. show that he agreed to a meeting with Veselnitskaya after being told the “crown prosecutor of Russia” wanted to give the Trump campaign incriminating information about Hillary Clinton. Instead, Veselnitskaya focused on the repeal of the Magnitsky Act, the 2012 Russian sanctions the US enacted over human rights abuses.
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Keep talking Donny. Just keep talking.
We’re listening….Trump weighs in on reports of Kremlin ties to Russian lawyer at Trump Tower meeting https://t.co/pliCy7JZOR
— Richard W. Painter (@RWPUSA) April 30, 2018
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