The GOP's protective wall around Trump is beginning to crumble
By Greg Sargent March 2 at 9:50 AM
The news is breaking that two prominent Republicans — House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy and House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz — are now calling on Attorney General Jeff Sessions to recuse himself from ongoing FBI investigations into Russian meddling in the election. This comes after The Post reported that Sessions twice spoke with the Russian ambassador during the campaign, after having claimed under oath that he had not had contact with Russian officials.
The latest moves by two senior Republicans amount to a sign that, little by little, the protective wall the GOP has built around President Trump is beginning to erode, though there is still a long, long way to go before we can expect any serious oversight.
It should be noted at the outset that the new revelations are nuanced. The Post report says that Sessions spoke twice with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak, including once in Sessions’s office. But at the time, Sessions was a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Testifying before Congress during his confirmation hearing, Sessions was asked what he’d do if he learned that the Trump campaign had communicated with the Russian government. Link to tweet
" target="_blank">He said: “I’m not aware of any of those activities. I have been called a surrogate at a time or two in that campaign and I did not have communications with the Russians.”
In that instance, Sessions appeared to be referring to himself in his role as a Trump campaign official, meaning that he did not speak to the Russian ambassador in that capacity. Meanwhile, in January, Senate Democrats asked Sessions for a written answer to this question: “Several of the President-elect’s nominees or senior advisers have Russian ties. Have you been in contact with anyone connected to any part of the Russian government about the 2016 election, either before or after election day?” Sessions responded: “No.” But there, too, the context of the question could easily have led Sessions to answer in his capacity as a “senior adviser” to Trump.
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