Thursday, March 2, 2017

Probably Resign, Definitely Recuse

In his confirmation hearing, Sen. Jeff Sessions was asked a simple question:

At his Jan. 10 Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing, Sessions was asked by Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) what he would do if he learned of any evidence that anyone affiliated with the Trump campaign communicated with the Russian government in the course of the 2016 campaign.
“I’m not aware of any of those activities,” he responded. He added: “I have been called a surrogate at a time or two in that campaign and I did not have communications with the Russians.”

But he did. He met with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak in September 2016. This is something you'd think Sessions would have remembered--and if the "communications" weren't anything out of the ordinary or were part of his Senate Committee duties, it doesn't seem to me that omitting them would have been the most truthful thing to do. But he didn't omit them--he positively stated that he "did not have communications with the Russians".

That sounds like perjury, regardless of what was discussed. It sounds also like he would be a potential subject of an investigation into the several Russia contacts with members of the Trump campaign. But in any case, this stinks on ice--I don't think with these optics, he can proceed effectively. He should probably resign, but he definitely must recuse himself from the Trump/Russia inquiry.

UPDATE: Recused, for now.

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