Concerns Rise About Kushner’s Lawyer After Don Jr. Meeting Outed
Patrick Howley
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Concerns are growing about Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner’s attorney Jamie Gorelick after Kushner officially disclosed the 2016 Trump Tower meeting that caused a scandal for Don Trump Jr.
A national security source expressed concern to Big League Politics about Gorelick’s role in representing Ivanka and Jared, considering Gorelick’s support for Hillary Clinton and the fact that she’s a partner at WilmerHale, where Robert Mueller served as partner until May, when he signed on to become the government’s special counsel in the Trump “Russia” case. Gorelick worked in the Bill Clinton Department of Justice with Merrick Garland, the failed Obama Supreme Court nominee who is seen as a hero-in-waiting for anti-Trumpers hoping to fight Trump’s “Drain the Swamp” policies. The source describes Gorelick and Garland as a “tag team” dating back years.
The White House is reportedly unsure who leaked to The New York Times, which cited three anonymous sources who claimed knowledge of Don Jr.’s emails setting up the meeting. Don Jr. published his full email correspondence himself on Twitter as the press coverage was taking off.
While there is no evidence at this time to suggest that Gorelick is trying to undermine President Trump, it is clear that members of the Trump Team using different attorneys can create conflicts within the White House inner circle. A lawyer’s job is to best represent their clients. President Trump and Don Jr. are not clients of Jamie Gorelick.
Don Trump Jr. defended himself on Hannity Tuesday night from allegations that he met with a Kremlin-linked lawyer to get opposition research on Hillary Clinton during the campaign. The lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya, denies that she is linked to the Kremlin, and Trump Jr. is successfully playing the story off as another nothingburger cooked up by the press to advance their unsubstantiated Russian collusion narrative.
But it’s interesting to point out how the story materialized before it was leaked. Kushner disclosed the meeting in revisions to his paperwork to become a White House adviser after previously not disclosing it, according to his attorney Gorelick.
Kushner disclosed the meeting with the Russian lawyer in revised documentation that he submitted to obtain a security clearance for his White House job as a senior adviser to the President, his lawyer, Jamie Gorelick, said in a statement.
When Kushner initially filed his forms, he did not list any contacts with foreign government officials, Gorelick said. Kushner then submitted supplemental information saying he had “numerous contacts” with foreign officials, she said.
Gorelick said the additional documentation includes the information “that during the campaign and transition, he had over 100 calls or meetings with representatives of more than 20 countries, most of which were during transition. Mr. Kushner has submitted additional updates and included, out of an abundance of caution, this meeting with a Russian person, which he briefly attended at the request of his brother-in-law, Donald Trump Jr. As Mr. Kushner has consistently stated, he is eager to cooperate and share what he knows.”
White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said he didn’t know much about the meeting when asked about it on “Fox News Sunday.”
“It was a very short meeting,’ Priebus said. “It was a meeting apparently about Russian adoption.”
He added: “Jared Kushner put in his disclosure a little prematurely. He’s since amended it. All of that is disclosed.”
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