McCain disturbed by reports of Kushner-Russia backchannel
WASHINGTON- Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said he is disturbed by recent media reports suggesting President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner had proposed the creation of a secret backchannel in which the Trump transition team could converse with Moscow.
“I know that some administration officials are saying: ‘well, that’s standard procedure.’ I don’t think it’s standard procedure prior to the inauguration of the President of the United States by someone who is not in an appointed position,” McCain told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s “7:30” on Monday.
McCain went on to suggest that Russia is in some ways more dangerous than the terror group ISIS.
“I think ISIS can do terrible things. “But it’s the Russians who tried to destroy the fundamental of democracy and that is to change the outcome of an American election,” he alleged.
The Washington Post reported Friday that Kushner in a December Trump Tower meeting with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak and then-soon-to-be-and-now-former White House National Security Adviser Michael Flynn-proposed that off the record correspondence could be conducted in Russian consulates inside the U.S. The Post based their report on claims made by unnamed U.S. officials who said they had been briefed on reports related to the alleged correspondence.
Kislyak is believed to have rejected the proposal as it could have compromised the integrity of Russian communications equipment.
Flynn resigned in February following reports that he had diplomatically engaged Kislyak prior to President Trump taking office and that Flynn misled Vice President Mike Pence about that conversation.
Those reports suggested that Flynn may have given Kislyak the impression that the incoming administration might be willing to consider lifting sanctions that were imposed on Moscow following Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea, a Ukrainian territory.
Shortly before leaving office, former President Barack Obama imposed additional sanctions on Russia after receiving information from the intelligence community suggesting the country tried to sabotage Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s campaign.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions in early March recused himself from the Justice Department’s Trump-Russia probe following The Washington Post reporting that he had twice met with Kislyak while a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Two weeks ago Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appointed former FBI Director Robert Muller as independent counsel in the Trump-Russia probe following two days of intense bipartisan criticism stemming from The New York Times reporting that recently fired FBI Director James Comey wrote a memo about a February meeting with President Donald Trump.
During the meeting the president reportedly told Comey that he hoped the Bureau would not pursue the investigation into Michael Flynn’s correspondence with Kislyak and the retired lieutenant general’s reported business dealings with Russia media outlets.
Multiple House and Senate Committees are investigating allegations of collusion between members of the Trump campaign and high-ranking Russian officials as well as Moscow’s attempt to manipulate the outcome of the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election.
This article is republished with permission from Talk Media News
Bryan is an award-winning political journalist who has extensive experience covering Congress and Maryland state government.
His work includes coverage of the election of Donald Trump, the confirmation hearings of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh and attorneys general William Barr and Jeff Sessions-as well as that of the Maryland General Assembly, Gov. Larry Hogan, and the COVID-19 pandemic.
Bryan has broken stories involving athletic and sexual assault scandals with the Baltimore Post-Examiner.
His original UMBC investigation gained international attention, was featured in People Magazine and he was interviewed by ABC’s “Good Morning America” and local radio stations. Bryan broke subsequent stories documenting UMBC’s omission of a sexual assault on their daily crime log and a federal investigation related to the university’s handling of an alleged sexual assault.