Trump's Inner Circle Met Russian Lawyer For Info On Clinton During Campaign: NYT

NEW YORK CITY, NY — Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort met with a Russian lawyer with ties to the Kremlin during the 2016 campaign to discuss damaging information about Hillary Clinton, according to a new report from the New York Times citing administrative sources and documents. On Saturday, the Times had reported on the meeting, and President Trump's eldest son said it had been arranged to discuss Russia-United States adoption policy. President Trump and his aides have previously denied strenuously that there was any contact between Russia and the campaign.

According to the report, lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya, who has lobbied on behalf of the Kremlin, offered damaging information about then-candidate Trump's general election opponent at a meeting in Trump Tower. A statement confirming much of the report on Sunday from Donald Trump Jr. said that the offer of information was merely a "pretext" for the meeting, and she only offered vague and unsupported claims of Russian funding for the Democratic National Committee. (For more information on this and other political stories, subscribe to the White House Patch to receive daily newsletters and breaking news alerts.)

Other important points in the report include:

• President Trump's son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner did not include this meeting, as he was required to by law, on his application for a security clearance.
• Preet Bharara, a former U.S. attorney who was summarily fired by the president after being told he could keep his job, was a target of Russian sanctions that were retaliation for a law Veselnitskaya has lobbied against.
• The president denies any knowledge of the meeting his son, son-in-law and campaign manager reportedly attended.

Watch: Donald Trump Jr. Changes His Story About Meeting With Russian Lawyer

Read the full report at the New York Times>>

Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images