(Goldstone told The Wall Street Journal he meant Veselnitskaya, when he talked about “Crown prosecutor.”)
But, as Trump Jr. said, she wasn’t interested in providing information about Clinton. Instead, she wanted to talk about the 2012 Magnitsky Act, a bill imposing sanctions on Russians involved in human rights violations. The bill originally targeted people thought to be involved in the death of Sergei Magnitsky in Russian prison in 2009. Magnitsky blew a whistle on an alleged $230 million Russian government tax scam.
Russia reacted by imposing sanctions on Americans it thought violated human rights. It also banned Americans from adopting Russian children.
But this wasn’t something the presidential campaign focused on, Trump Jr. said.
“I was basically sitting there listening as a courtesy to my acquaintance,” he said. Kushner left the 20-minute meeting after about 10 minutes, while Manafort mostly tended to his phone, Trump Jr. said.
After the meeting, Trump Jr. said, Goldstone apologized to him for wasting his time.
Veselnitskaya denies any connection to the Russian government. But she has been fighting against the Magnitsky Act since its inception, advocating for repealing it.
On April 20 Trump issued a memorandum that expressed “support for this important legislation [Magnitsky Act] and makes clear our commitment to its robust and thorough enforcement.”
There have been no reports linking any incriminating information about Hillary Clinton’s connections with Russia to the Veselnitskaya meeting.
In absence of evidence of any incriminating information provided, what remains is Trump Jr.’s willingness to listen.
While he expressed skepticism about the claims in Goldstone’s email, he was willing to explore them.
“That’s what we do in business. If there’s an information out there, you want it and then you make what you do with it. If there was something that came from it that was shady, if it was a danger to national security, I would obviously bring it right to someone. But I didn’t know what anything was. It turns out it was nothing and therefore there’s nothing to actually be able to talk about,” he said.
It would be a stretch to portray such behavior as criminal, according to Jonathan Turley, professor of constitutional law at George Washington University.
“If this is a crime, then a wide array of contacts that routinely occur between politicians and foreign nationals would also be a crime, and then you raise serious free speech and association concerns under the Constitution,” he told Fox’s Martha McCallum on July 10.
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