The June 3, 2016, email sent to Donald Trump Jr. could hardly have been more explicit: One of his father’s former Russian business partners had been contacted by a senior Russian government official and was offering to provide the Trump campaign with dirt on Hillary Clinton.

The documents “would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father,” read the email, written by a trusted intermediary, who added, “This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump.”

If the future president’s eldest son was surprised or disturbed by the provenance of the promised material — or the notion that it was part of a continuing effort by the Russian government to aid his father’s campaign — he gave no indication.

He replied within minutes: “If it’s what you say I love it especially later in the summer.”

Four days later, after a flurry of emails, the intermediary wrote back, proposing a meeting in New York on Thursday with a “Russian government attorney.”

Donald Trump Jr. agreed, adding that he would most likely bring along “Paul Manafort (campaign boss)” and “my brother-in-law,” Jared Kushner, now one of the president’s closest White House advisers.

On June 9, the Russian lawyer was sitting in the younger Mr. Trump’s office on the 25th floor of Trump Tower, just one level below the office of the future president.

Over the last several days, The New York Times has disclosed the existence of the meeting, whom it involved and what it was about. The story has unfolded as The Times has been able to confirm details of the meetings.

But the email exchanges, which were reviewed by The Times, offer a detailed unspooling of how the meeting with the Kremlin-connected Russian lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya, came about — and just how eager Donald Trump Jr. was to accept what he was explicitly told was the Russian government’s help.

The Justice Department, as well as the House and Senate Intelligence Committees, is examining whether any of President Trump’s associates colluded with the Russian government to disrupt last year’s election. American intelligence agencies have determined that the Russian government tried to sway the election in favor of Mr. Trump.

The precise nature of the promised damaging information about Mrs. Clinton is unclear, and there is no evidence to suggest that it was related to Russian-government computer hacking that led to the release of thousands of Democratic National Committee emails. But in recent days, accounts by some of the central organizers of the meeting, including Donald Trump Jr., have evolved or have been contradicted by the written email records.

After being told that The Times was about to publish the content of the emails, instead of responding to a request for comment, Donald Trump Jr. tweeted out images of them himself on Tuesday.

“To everyone, in order to be totally transparent, I am releasing the entire email chain of my emails” about the June 9 meeting, he wrote. “I first wanted to just have a phone call but when that didn’t work out, they said the woman would be in New York and asked if I would meet.”

OPEN DOCUMENT

He added that nothing came of it.

On Monday, Donald Trump Jr. said on Twitter that it was hardly unusual to take information on an opponent. And on Tuesday morning, he tweeted, “Media & Dems are extremely invested in the Russia story. If this nonsense meeting is all they have after a yr, I understand the desperation!”

At a White House briefing on Tuesday, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the deputy press secretary, read a statement from President Trump in which he defended his son. “My son is a high-quality person, and I applaud his transparency,” the president said.

But Ms. Sanders said she was “going to have to refer everything on this matter to Don Jr.’s counsel.” She said she did not know when the president had last spoken with his son.

The back story to the June 9 meeting involves an eclectic cast of characters the Trump family knew from its business dealings in Moscow.

The initial email outreach came from Rob Goldstone, a British-born former tabloid reporter and entertainment publicist who first met the future president when the Trump Organization was trying to do business in Russia.

In the June 3 email, Mr. Goldstone told Donald J. Trump Jr. that he was writing on behalf of a mutual friend, one of Russia’s biggest pop music stars, Emin Agalarov. Emin, who professionally uses his first name only, is the son of Aras Agalarov, a real estate tycoon sometimes called the “Donald Trump of Russia.”

The elder Agalarov boasts close ties to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia: His company has won several large state building contracts, and Mr. Putin awarded him the Order of Honor of the Russian Federation.

Mr. Agalarov joined with the elder Mr. Trump to bring the Miss Universe contest to Moscow in 2013, and the Trump and Agalarov families grew relatively close.

When Emin released a music video with a theme borrowed from the television show “The Apprentice,” Mr. Trump, then the show’s star, made a cameo appearance, delivering his trademark line: “You’re fired!” The elder Mr. Agalarov had also partnered with the Trumps to build a Trump hotel in Moscow, but the deal never came to fruition.

“Emin just called and asked me to contact you with something very interesting,” Mr. Goldstone wrote in the email. “The Crown prosecutor of Russia met with his father Aras this morning and in their meeting offered to provide the Trump campaign with some official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father.”

He added, “What do you think is the best way to handle this information and would you be able to speak to Emin about it directly?”

There is no such title as crown prosecutor in Russia — the Crown Prosecution Service is a British term — but the equivalent in Russia is the prosecutor general of Russia.

That office is held by Yury Yakovlevich Chaika, a Putin appointee who is known to be close to Ms. Veselnitskaya.

After sending back his “love it” reply, Donald Trump Jr. arranged to speak with Emin, sending along his private cellphone number on June 6.

“Ok he’s on stage in Moscow but should be off within 20 Minutes so I’m sure can call,” Mr. Goldstone wrote at 3:43 p.m.

Within the hour, Donald Trump Jr. had responded: “Rob thanks for the help. D.”

The following day, Mr. Goldstone followed up: “Don Hope all is well Emin asked that I schedule a meeting with you and The Russian government attorney who is flying over from Moscow for this Thursday. I believe you are aware of this meeting — and so wondered if 3pm or later on Thursday works for you?”

Mr. Goldstone’s emails contradict statements he made in his interview with The Times on Monday, when he said that he did not know whether the elder Mr. Agalarov had any role in arranging the meeting, and that he had no knowledge of any official Russian government role in the offer to provide the Trump campaign with dirt on Mrs. Clinton. Instead, he said that Ms. Veselnitskaya had contacted Emin directly, and that Emin had asked him to reach out to the Trumps as a favor to her.

“I actually asked him at one point how he knew her, and he said, ‘I can’t remember but, you know, I know thousands of people,’ ” he said in the interview.

Subsequent efforts to reach Mr. Goldstone, who acknowledged in the interview that he had spoken with someone at the Trump Organization over the weekend in anticipation of news media attention, have been unsuccessful.

Mr. Goldstone, in a June 7 follow-up email, wrote, “I will send the names of the two people meeting with you for security when I have them later today.”

By that time, as the Republican nominee, Mr. Trump was already under the protection of the Secret Service and access to Trump Tower in New York was strictly controlled. Ms. Veselnitskaya told The Times that the person who accompanied her was an interpreter whom she declined to name.

After being informed that the Russian lawyer could not make the 3 p.m. time that had been proposed, and agreeing to move it by an hour, Donald Trump Jr. forwarded the entire email chain to Mr. Kushner’s company work email, and to Mr. Manafort at his Trump campaign email.

“Meeting got moved to 4 tomorrow at my offices,” he wrote on June 8. “Best, Don.”

Mr. Kushner recently disclosed the fact of the meeting, though not the content, in a revised form on which all those seeking top secret security clearances are required to list contacts with foreign government officials and their representatives. The Times reported in April that he had failed to list a number of Russian contacts, which his lawyer called an error.

Mr. Manafort also disclosed that a meeting had occurred, and that Donald Trump Jr. had organized it, in response to one of the Russia-related congressional investigations.

Representatives for both men did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Ms. Veselnitskaya arrived the next day and was ushered into Donald Trump Jr.’s office for a meeting with what amounted to the Trump campaign’s brain trust.

Besides having politically connected clients, one of whom was under investigation by federal prosecutors at the time of the meeting, Ms. Veselnitskaya is well known for her lobbying efforts against the Magnitsky Act, a 2012 law that punishes designated Russian human rights abusers by allowing the United States to seize their assets and keep them from entering the country. The law so angered Mr. Putin that he retaliated by barring American families from adopting Russian children. Her activities and associations have brought her to the attention of the F.B.I., according to a former senior law enforcement official.

When first contacted by The Times on Saturday, Donald Trump Jr. portrayed the meeting this way: “It was a short introductory meeting. I asked Jared and Paul to stop by. We primarily discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children that was active and popular with American families years ago and was since ended by the Russian government, but it was not a campaign issue at the time and there was no follow up.”

The next day, after The Times informed him that it was preparing an article that would say that the meeting also involved a discussion about potentially compromising material on Mrs. Clinton, he issued another statement: “I was asked to have a meeting by an acquaintance I knew from the 2013 Miss Universe pageant with an individual who I was told might have information helpful to the campaign. I was not told her name prior to the meeting. I asked Jared and Paul to attend, but told them nothing of the substance,” he said. “After pleasantries were exchanged, the woman stated that she had information that individuals connected to Russia were funding the Democratic National Committee and supporting Ms. Clinton. Her statements were vague, ambiguous and made no sense. No details or supporting information was provided or even offered. It quickly became clear that she had no meaningful information. She then changed subjects and began discussing the adoption of Russian children and mentioned the Magnitsky Act. It became clear to me that this was the true agenda all along and that the claims of potentially helpful information were a pretext for the meeting.”

Mr. Goldstone recalled the meeting in much the same way.

Ms. Veselnitskaya offered “just a vague, generic statement about the campaign’s funding and how people, including Russian people, living all over the world donate when they shouldn’t donate” before turning to her anti-Magnitsky Act arguments, he said. “It was the most inane nonsense I’ve ever heard.”

Ms. Veselnitskaya, for her part, said in an statement to The Times sent this past weekend that “nothing at all about the presidential campaign” had been discussed at the Trump Tower meeting, adding that she had “never acted on behalf of the Russian government” and that she had “never discussed any of these matters with any representative of the Russian government.” She has not responded to requests for comment since.

A spokesman for Mr. Putin said on Monday that he did not know Ms. Veselnitskaya and that he had no knowledge of the June 2016 meeting.

Back in Washington, both the White House and a spokesman for President Trump’s lawyer have taken pains to distance the president from the meeting, saying that he did he not attend it and that he learned about it only recently.

Mr. Agalarov did not respond to a request for comment.

Emin, the pop star at the center of it all, will not comment on the matter, either, Mr. Goldstone, his publicist, said on Monday. “Emin said to me that I could tell journalists that you know he has decided to go with just a straight no comment. His reasoning for that is simply that he believes that by him commenting in any way from Russia it once again will open this debate of Trump Trump Russia. Now here’s another person from Russia. Now he’s another person from Russia. So he wants to just not comment on the story. That’s his reasoning. It’s — the story will play out however it plays out.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/11/us/politics/trump-russia-email-clinton.html

‘I love it’: Don Jr forced to reveal email chain with shadowy British PR that shows he leaped at offer of Russian ‘official documents incriminating Hillary’ – as President Trump defends son as ‘high quality person’

• An explosive email chain reveals the terms on which Donald Trump Jr met with a Russian lawyer about dirt on Hillary Clinton
• The email from PR exec Robert Goldstone explicitly mentions Russian ‘government’ support for his father’s campaign
• It offers information that would ‘incriminate’ rival Hillary Clinton with information about her Russia dealings 
• Days later, the president’s son, son-in-law Jared Kushner, and campaign chair Paul Manafort met a Russian lawyer at Trump Tower 
• ‘This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump’ 
• President Trump hailed his eldest son as a ‘high quality person’ in a briefing statement read at a daily White House briefing 
• Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya spoke to NBC News and denied working for the Russian government or having information on Hillary
• The dollar fell against major currencies after Trump Jr released the email chain 

By Geoff Earle, Deputy U.s. Political Editor For Dailymail.com and Nikki Schwab, U.s. Political Reporter For Dailymail.com and Liam Quinn For Dailymail.com

PUBLISHED: 11:33 EDT, 11 July 2017 | UPDATED: 18:32 EDT, 11 July 2017

Donald Trump Jr. on Tuesday dramatically published the email which shows how a shadowy PR got him to meet a Russian lawyer with the offer of ‘incriminating’ foreign government information about Hillary Clinton.

The president’s son used his Twitter account to release the message from Rob Goldstone for ‘transparency’ – and was immediately praised by his father.

‘My son is a high quality person and I applaud his transparency,’ the president said in a statement read from the podium by deputy White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders at an off-camera briefing.

Trump Jr.’s email dump followed a drip-drip of reports about the meeting which had prompted Trump Jr. to change his story about what happened, and led to a new sense of crisis in the White House over allegations of collusion with Russia to win the presidential election.

The publication set off an explosive reaction in Washington and beyond, with the Dow and the dollar falling when the four pages of emails were published.

It showed how Trump Jr. laid out the welcome mat when a shadowy public relations exec sent him an email offering information about Hillary Clinton and mentioned Russian government support for his father, new bombshell emails reveal.

Scroll down for video 

 ‘I love it,’ Donald Trump responded when offered information about Hillary Clinton in an email that mentioned Russian government support for his father

Video playing bottom right…

The June 3, 2016,  email offering potential dirt, was penned by British PR exec Robert Goldstone.

It explicitly stated that the info Trump would receive was part of Russian support for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, for which Trump’s eldest son was a trusted advisor and surrogate.

‘This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump,’ according to one of the emails, which were first obtained by the New York Times, but not published in full by the newspaper.

The email claimed that the information ‘would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father.’

Key passage: Goldstone offered official information from a Russia ‘crown prosecutor’ – a British term equivalent to a United States attorney –  which would incriminate Hillary Clinton. Trump Jr responded: ‘I love it.’

The claims of juicy information by way of Moscow appeared to enthrall the president’s eldest son, according to the email.

‘If it’s what you say I love it especially later in the summer,’ the president’s son responded, referencing the high-impact portion of the campaign when voters tend to focus on the election.

Days later, Goldstone wrote back to arrange a meeting with a Russian attorney, Natalia Veselnitskaya.

The meeting occurred on June 9 of 2016. The president’s son wrote that he would be bringing ‘Paul Manafort (campaign boss)’ and ‘my brother-in-law’ – Jared Kushner. The trio represented some of the most high-powered influence within the Trump campaign.

All three reportedly attended the meeting.

Goldstone told Trump Jr in the email that the information came from ‘Emin’, the Russian pop singer whose career the 57-year-old British pop PR manages.

Emin’s full name is Emin Agalarov, and his father Aras Agalarov is a Russian-Azerbaijani construction and property tycoon, who had extensive dealings with the Trumps.

Goldstone sent the email when he was with Emin at an exclusive Russian venue, his social media profiles showed.

‘What do you think is the best way to handle this information and would you be able to speak to Emin about it directly?’ according to the email chain posted by Trump Jr.

Goldstone then offered: ‘I can also send this info to your father via Rhona [Trump Snr’s personal assistant], but it is ultra sensitive so wanted to send to you first.’

Russian lawyer speaks about the meeting with Donald Trump Jr

 Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya confirmed her meeting with Donald Trump Jr, Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort to NBC News

Vanessa Trump is photographed leaving her home in New York closely followed by her security service detail. She walked three blocks to get into another secret service vehicle

According to the email chain Trump, Jr posted, he replied in full: ‘Thanks Rob I appreciate that. I am on the road at the moment but perhaps I just speak to Emin first. Seems we have some time and if it’s what you say I live it especially later in the summer. Could we do a call first thing next week when I am back?’

The meeting went ahead, however, and is now at the center of the Russian links scandal.

On Tuesday Democrats were seizing on the email as evidence of ‘collusion’, the smoking gun which has so far eluded them in their attempt to cast President Trump’s victory as tainted by involvement with Russia.

The email will also be closely examined by special counsel Robert Mueller, his team of prosecutors and FBI agents, to establish if it constitutes evidence of collusion.

FOUR DAYS WHICH ROCKED DON JR – AND HIS DAD

Saturday:

The New York Times reports that Trump, Jr. met with a Russian national, Donald Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner, and campaign chairman Paul Manafort during the campaign. Trump says the subject was Russian adoption.

Sunday:

The Times reports that the meeting had to do with potentially damaging information on Hillary Clinton.

Trump, Jr. releases a revised statement where he acknowledges the meeting was about Clinton material, but that the information provided made ‘no sense.’ He said he was approached by an acquaintance from the 2013 Miss Universe pageant.

A spokesman for President Trump’s attorney said the president did not know about the meeting.

The Russian attorney who attended the meeting is identified as Natalia Veselnitskaya, who has Kremlin ties.

The Washington Post identifies the person who set up the meeting as British-born PR exec Robert Godlstone.

Goldstone says he set up the meeting at the request of pop star Emin Agalarov, the son of a Russian real estate baron and who had Trump appear in a music video.

Monday:

The White House denies any involvement in the meeting by President Trump.

Members of the Senate Intelligence Committee call on Trump Jr. to testify.

Trump Jr. responds that he is glad to answer questions and mocks accusations against him on Twitter.

The Times reports citing sources that Trump Jr was told that the material in his meeting with Veselnitskaya was part of a Kremlin-backed effort to help Donald Trump.

Tuesday:

Natalia Veselnitskaya gives a sit-down interview with NBC and denies working for the Russian government but confirms the meeting.

Donald Trump Jr. releases a chain of emails between himself and Goldstone in the name of ‘transparency.’ The Times says it had asked him for comment before the release.

The emails to Trump Jr. feature Goldstone offering to pass on ‘high level and sensitive information’ that he says is ‘part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump.’ Trump Jr. responds: ‘I love it.’

The White House releases a statement from President Trump stating: ‘My son is a high quality person and I applaud his transparency.’

Former Clinton running mate Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia says Trump Jr. may have even committed ‘treason’

Trump Jr. is scheduled to appear on Fox News’ ‘Hannity.’

A U.S. official says special counsel Robert Mueller will review Trump Jr’s emails.

Donald Trump Jr has denied getting any useful information out of the meeting, saying the information pertaining to alleged funding by Russians of Democrats made ‘no sense,’ although he has acknowledged that the meeting got arranged after an offer of information about Hillary Clinton.

His initial statement about the meeting Saturday when it was first reported did not mention that it was called to discuss dirt on Clinton.

The Russian lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya, who Trump Jr and other Trump campaign associates met with last June, suggested they were the ones who were looking for damaging information on Hillary Clinton.

‘I never had any damaging or sensitive information about Hillary Clinton. It was never my intention to have that,’ she told NBC News’ Today show. ‘It’s quite possible that maybe they were looking for such information, they wanted it so badly.’

Asked if she had worked for the Russian government, she denied it. ‘Nyet,’ she said.

She confirmed the participants of the meeting when asked about the ‘purpose’ of the Trump Tower get-together by NBC’s Keir Simmons.

Goldstone has done work for British tabloids and was a journalist before become a PR executive. According to his profile, the Manchester-born PR exec has done work for Michael Jackson, BB King, and billionaire Richard Branson. He says he toured extensively with the king of pop during his ‘Bad’ tour of Australia.

 Miss Connecticut USA Erin Brady and Donald Trump look on as Russian singer Emin Agalarov speaks onstage during a news conference after Brady won the 2013 Miss USA pageant at PH Live at Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino on June 16, 2013 in Las Vegas, Nevada

 In her first exclusive interview, the woman at the center of the storm – Russian attorney Natalia Veselnitskaya – said she wasn’t working for the Russian government

Sitting down with NBC News’ Keir Simmons (left), Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya (right) said she never had any damaging information about Hillary Clinton to provide the Trump campaign

 Donald Trump Jr met with Natalia Veselnitskaya at Trump Tower last June, just two weeks after his father wrapped up the Republican nomination

Goldstone wrote in the email that he was reaching out on behalf of Emin Agalarov, and Azerbaijan-born pop star who once cut a music video featuring Miss Universe contestants that concluded with an appearance by Donald Trump.

Emin is the son of real estate tycoon Aras Agalarov, who worked with the senior Trump on an unrealized effort to build a Trump Tower in Moscow.

‘I never knew who else would be attending the meeting. All I knew was Donald Trump Jr was willing to meet with me,’ she said.

The Trump son, the Russian lawyer explained, only asked her one question.

‘The question that I was asked was as follows: whether I had any financial records which might prove that the funds used to sponsor the DNC were coming from inappropriate sources,’ she told NBC.

The emails to Trump Jr came from PR exec Robert Goldstone. He claimed to have learned from pop musician Emin, whom he represents, that a Russian prosecutor provided information about Clinton to Emin’s father

Donald Trump, Jr’s statement on release of email chain

To everyone, in order to be totally transparent, I am releasing the entire email chain of my emails with Rob Goldstone about the meeting on June 9, 2016. The first email on June 3, 2016 was from Rob, who was relating a request from Emin, a person I knew from the 2013 Ms. Universe Pageant near Moscow. Emin and his father have a very highly respected company in Moscow. The information they suggested they had about Hillary Clinton I thought was Political Opposition Research. I first wanted to just have a phone call but when that didn’t work out, they said the woman would be in New York and asked if I would meet. I decided to take the meeting. The woman, as she has said publicly, was not a government official. And, as we have said, she had no information to provide and wanted to talk about adoption policy and the Magnitsky Act. To put this in context, this occurred before the current Russian fever was in vogue. As Rob Goldstone said just today in the press, the entire meeting was “the most inane nonsense I ever heard. And I was actually agitated by it.”

  Veselnitskaya said she replied that had no such records adding ‘it was never my intention to collect any financial records to that end.’

She also confirmed that President Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and his campaign chairman Paul Manafort were in the room.

‘I could recognize the young gentleman who was only present in the meeting for only the first seven to 10 minutes and then stood up and left the room. It was Jared Kushner,’ she continued. ‘And he never came back, by the way.’

‘And the other individual who was at the same meeting, was always looking at his phone. he was reading something he never took any active part in the conversation,’ she aded. ‘That was Mr. Manafort.’

As the media he rips as ‘fake news’ went into overdrive over the story, Donald Trump, Jr played down the importance of the meeting and emails in a statement he posted on Twitter.

‘The woman, as she has said publicly, was not a government official,’ he wrote. ‘And, as we have said, she had no information to provide and wanted to talk about adoption policy and the Magnitsky Act. To put this in context, this occurred before the current Russian fever was in vogue.’

On day four of the explosive story, there was a long chain of events that forced the release of the emails. On Saturday, the New York Times reported on the meeting with a Russian national, the first known of its kind. Then on Sunday, the paper reported based on sources that the meeting was set up to discuss information on Hillary Clinton. On Monday night, the New York Times revealed that Trump Jr was allegedly told before his meeting with Veselnitskaya that the ‘Russian government was the source of the potentially damaging information’ in an email from British PR guru Rob Goldstone. On Tuesday, the Times quoted verbatim from the emails themselves, and on Tuesday afternoon Trump Jr. released the what he said were the full emails in an act of transparency.

 Trump, Jr posted the email exchange online Tuesday

Trump, Jr posted the email exchange online Tuesday

Trump, Jr posted the email exchange online Tuesday

The newspaper’s account Monday account based on conversations with ‘three people with knowledge’ of what it contained. 

It added: ‘There is no evidence to suggest that the promised damaging information was related to Russian government computer hacking that led to the release of thousands of Democratic National Committee emails.’

The meeting took place on June 9 – weeks after Trump clinched the Republican nomination.

Veselnitskaya didn’t say who initially set up the meeting while she was visiting New York for work, but told NBC she was met by Goldstone when she arrived at Trump Tower.

Don Jr’s lawyer attempted to downplay the reports in a statement given to the Times on Monday, instead trying to shift the blame to Clinton.

‘In my view, this is much ado about nothing. During this busy period, Robert Goldstone contacted Don Jr. in an email and suggested that people had information concerning alleged wrongdoing by Democratic Party front-runner, Hillary Clinton, in her dealings with Russia,’ Alan Futerfas told the newspaper.

‘Don Jr.’s takeaway from this communication was that someone had information potentially helpful to the campaign and it was coming from someone he knew. Don Jr. had no knowledge as to what specific information, if any, would be discussed.’

 Trump Jr, Jared Kushner, and Paul Manafort met with Kremlin-linked lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya last summer in Manhattan

PR guru Rob Goldstone (pictured) says he facilitated the controversial meeting between Donald Trump’s son and a Russian lawyer who promised ‘dirt’ on Hillary Clinton

 Goldstone posted this picture of himself wearing a t-shirt with ‘RUSSIA’ emblazoned across his chest after the election result

Goldstone also ‘checked in’ at ‘Trump Organization’ in New York City on June 9, 2016 – the day Trump Jr, Kushner, and Manafort met with Moscow-linked lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya. Based on the post, it appears as though he chose the wrong option title, which is why it says he is in Jakarta, Indonesia, but the location on the map matches up with Trump Tower

When the newspaper contacted Kushner and his lawyers about the new allegations, they ‘deferred questions on the content of the meeting’ to Trump Jr.

Manafort declined to comment through a spokesman who contacted the Times.

The potentially damning allegation comes after White House remained adamant the president’s son did not collaborate with the Russians to secure a favorable outcome in November’s election.

‘The president’s campaign did not collude in any way,’ White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Monday during an off-camera question and answer session. ‘I would certainly say Don Jr. did not collude with anybody to influence the election.’

Shortly after she finished, Reuters reported that Don Jr had hired criminal defense attorney Futerfas to represent him.

Don Jr offered Clinton info during Russian meeting: New York Times

Trump Jr, Kushner, and Manafort’s meeting with Veselnitskaya came during a period of weeks when the Democratic National Committee was hacked, Wikileaks posted thousands of DNC emails, and Trump associates met with Russia’s ambassador to the US.

The Senate Intelligence Committee is reportedly interested in speaking to Trump Jr, a committee source told NBC news.

WHO IS NATALIA VESELNITSKAYA?

• Lawyer known for waging harsh public campaign the 2012 Magnitsky Act
• She is married to a former deputy transportation minister of the Moscow region
• She is also the family lawyer for Denis Katsyv, the son of senior Russian government official Pyotr Katsyv
• Katsyv’s real-estate company Prevezon was under investigation by the Department of Justice at the time of the meeting
• Prevezon allegedly laundered millions of dollars into New York City real estate
• The case was settled for approximately $6 million in May

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, told reporters Monday that ‘our intelligence committee needs to interview him and others who attended the meeting,’ which took place in Trump Tower in June 9 last year.

‘I think it’s appropriate that he does that to clear this up,’ Democrat Jack Reed, a senior Intelligence and Armed Services member who has forged ties with members of both parties, added when speaking to CNN.

The committee is already probing contacts between Trump campaign officials and Russians last year.

Trump Jr defended himself Monday prior to the latest allegations surfacing, by claiming he ‘had to listen’ to the potentially damaging information.

He also appeared to contradict himself from earlier statements, in which he claimed he didn’t know the identity of the Russian attendee before it happened and that the substance was about adoption.

The latest developments add further fuel to suspicions that officials with the president’s campaign actively colluded with the Kremlin to tilt the election in their favor.

Ties between officials close to Trump and Moscow have drawn scrutiny from the FBI and Congress in light of assessments that the Russian government hacked the Democratic National Committee and Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta’s email account.

 Rob Goldstone (left) is pictured during a meeting with Donald Trump (right) in Las Vegas in 2013. An email from him reportedly alerted Trump Jr to Russia’s role in the Clinton ‘dirt’

The goal was to sway the election toward Trump and away from Clinton, intelligence officials said.

Former FBI director Robert Mueller is leading the investigation as a special counsel into whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia to hack the election.

Both Russia and the Trump campaign deny this.

Veselnitskaya, is the wife of a former Russian government minister and best known for her public attacks on American sanctions aimed at Russian human rights abusers.

The Magnitsky Act imposed visa bans and asset freezes on Russian officials linked to the 2009 death in prison of Sergei Magnitsky, a 37-year-old Russian whistleblower.

Russia has demanded that the US repeal the legislation since its passage in 2012. President Vladimir Putin was so enraged by the law that he halted American adoptions of Russian children as retaliation.

The Times also reported over the weekend Veselnitskaya’s clients include state-owned businesses and the son of a senior government official whose company was under investigation in the United States at the time of the meeting.

 She said she hasn’t enjoyed being the center of the news.

‘Imagine yourself in my shoes. One morning you wake up and all of the sudden you’re the focus of all the high ranking, upstream media of the world,’ Veselnitskaya told NBC.

‘To summarize, those were not the happiest days of my life, I have to say,’ she continued. ‘I have to break up my holiday, I have to take a trip back to Moscow, because I just wanted to be able to answer the questions myself.’

THE RUSSIAN MEETING – AND THE QUESTIONS NEEDING ANSWERED

Donald Trump Jr’s meeting with a Russian lawyer after the offer of ‘incriminating’ official material about Hillary Clinton has set off a firestorm around Washington.

But confirmation that the Trump campaign met with a Russian to get dirt has only raised more questions. 

Who leaked the fact of the meeting and the emails?

The bombshell that Donald Trump Jr had met a Russian lawyer and the subsequent release of the email in which he said ‘I love it’ to the idea of official Moscow dirt on Clinton has electrified U.S. politics – and could be a third rail for the White House.

The fact of the meeting was disclosed to White House ethics officials in updated forms from Jared Kushner. That means there are plenty of people with knowledge of the forms who could have leaked. The Trump White House will want to focus on the idea of Obama-friendly holdovers as the likely source. But anyone who has an ax to grind against the Trump family could also gain; and that means anyone who is not in the Jared Kushner camp will be a possibility.

However the email leak is much more intriguing, because it could have come from anyone with access to the email – which means Rob Goldstone, the paunchy British PR would be prime suspect. Also in the frame: Putin’s Kremlin, who could well have had the email from one of the Agalarovs.

Then there is the Robert Mueller investigation. It is unknown if they have accessed Don Jr’s emails yet but if they have, could also be a candidate for leaking.

And U.S. intelligence agencies could have the emails too. Goldstone and the Agalarovs are foreigners with no right to be shielded from spying, while Don Jr’s name could have been ‘unmasked’.

What actually happened at the meeting?

So far we have only a sketchy version of events, with Don Jr’s story and that of the lawyer herself roughly matching – but offering no real details. Still to be thrashed out are whether the lawyer really did walk out telling the Trump campaign nothing valuable at all; and what Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort heard.

Who really set up the meeting – and why?

Rob Goldstone acted for his client, pop singer Emin, who claimed to have been called by a Russian prosecutor with information when he emailed Don Jr.

But who actually initiated it remains murky. Russian prosecutors do not just pick up the phone to pop stars who are sons of Putin-connected billionaires. That makes the Kremlin prime suspect for setting up the meeting.

And it could well have done so as a feint to see how the Trumps reacted. By rushing to reply ‘I love it’ Don Jr made clear that an unsolicited approach from an apparently connected Russian would get top-level attention.

So the Kremlin could both safely assume that if it really wanted to tip the scales with real information, it would get an audience.

And it would have a handy piece of ‘kompromat’ [information which can be used to blackmail or influence the subject] regardless – as Don Jr is finding out today.

If we didn’t know about this meeting, could there have been others? 

The drip-drip of undisclosed meetings raises the possibility Don Jr met other Russians – for the simple reason that as a private citizen he does not need to make any declaration. Until he definitively lists everyone he has met, the possibility of more is out there. Then there are any other Trump aides or associates who are not now White House employees whose meetings remain unaccounted for.

Who was the lawyer Trump Jr met really working for?

Natalia Veselnitskiya claimed to be campaigner for inter-country adoptions. They were banned not by the U.S. but by Russia in retaliation for sanctions in Kremlin-linked companies and individuals. So who funded her campaign? Putin is the obvious candidate but his usual method for such campaigns is  to have it run remotely through a trusted oligarch.

How exactly do the Trumps and the Agalarovs know each other? 

The precise beginning of the relationship between two family-run real estate empires, one from Russia, the other from Manhattan, is still not clear. The Agalarovs turned up in Las Vegas in 2012 to woo the Trumps to bring Miss Universe to Moscow.

They got the red carpet, literally, posing with Donald Trump. So was that their first encounter? Donald Trump Jr had been in Moscow a lot around 2008 exploring opportunities there but he did not seem to be associated with the Agalarovs. What happened to get them to Vegas is still a mystery.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4686046/I-love-Don-Jr-s-reaction-Hillary-dirt-Russia.html#ixzz4mZ7H7iVw