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GMA: White House calls reported Trump meeting with Russian ambassador 'absurd'

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T

Tripon

Member
The White House is downplaying reports that then-candidate Donald Trump met the Russian ambassador to the United States at a 2016 campaign event, just before Trump delivered a speech that called for “an easing of tensions” with Russia.

The reports of Trump’s April 2016 encounter with Ambassador Sergey Kislyak comes just days after two of Trump's top advisers -- former national security adviser Michael Flynn and Attorney General Jeff Sessions -- became embroiled in controversy following the revelation that they each spoke with the ambassador prior to the Inauguration.

Kislyak was seated in the front row as Trump delivered a 45-minute foreign policy address at Washington’s Mayflower Hotel, ABC News reported Sunday.

“If they met, it was in passing at arrival reception hosted by National Interest which [Trump] was present at for all of 5 minutes,” a senior White House official said Saturday. “We arrived minutes before the speech began and departed immediately after.”
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Last May, the Wall Street Journal reported that Trump met the ambassador at a private reception prior to speech, sponsored by the Center for the National Interest, a non-partisan think tank.
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https://www.yahoo.com/gma/white-hou...mbassador-035054205--abc-news-topstories.html
 
O

onadesertedisland

Member
And there is the proof. That will be denied. Ignored. And ultimately, after a year later when undeniable treason becomes evident, people will ask why nothing was done earlier.
 
Z

ZSaberLink

Media Create Maven
If I'm not mistaken, other country's ambassadors were actually there at that speech. He probably did meet with the Russian ambassador, but it seems a little less egregious than all of the other ridiculous meetings.
 
G

Geist-

Member
“If they met, it was in passing at arrival reception hosted by National Interest which [Trump] was present at for all of 5 minutes,” a senior White House official said Saturday. “We arrived minutes before the speech began and departed immediately after.”
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"I just want to assure everyone that if you do find evidence of Trump meeting with the Ambassador, which we aren't saying happened, it was completely innocent and not at all treasonous."
 
J

jelly

Member
As if you do something like that and basically ignore the ambassador while you are there. They've been caught. It's just now about linking it all together with some proof that can take the administration down.
 
T

theWB27

Member
ZSaberLink said:
If I'm not mistaken, other country's ambassadors were actually there at that speech. He probably did meet with the Russian ambassador, but it seems a little less egregious than all of the other ridiculous meetings.
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Then why would it be so hard to believe the meeting would be scheduled with many other ambassadors just so they can say there were so many other there?

Trump stated he never met the guy didn't he?
 
C

Carpe Carnim

Member
ZSaberLink said:
If I'm not mistaken, other country's ambassadors were actually there at that speech. He probably did meet with the Russian ambassador, but it seems a little less egregious than all of the other ridiculous meetings.
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Why do folks assume it was the meeting that's at issue here? The issue is the cozy nature of the relationship, with an adversarial nation, in the midst of a cyber-war scandal, and then spending a year lying and obfuscating, despite the interactions being reported on and visually recorded by established press from all across the ideological spectrum.

As always: are you going to believe Trump, or your lying eyes?
 
G

gcubed

Member
i want someone to actually come out and say that Trump isn't old Trump, but actually a failed experiment by the science team at the Kremlin when he was there for his last visit.

Then ask congress to investigate it, because I heard this before, and people are saying these things.
 
O

Osiris

I permanently banned my 6 year old daughter from using the PS4 for mistakenly sending grief reports as it's too hard to watch or talk to her
"Never met the guy, not spoken to a Russian in years..."

"(Oh, except when I might have met him, and spoke to him, oh yeah... oopsy!, my bad!)"

Why is the default to lie first, clarify later with this guy?, that's the action of a guilty conscience.

Oh that's right, because he's a lying fraud, I forgot.
 
R

RMI

Banned
Knuckle Sandwich said:
Does the White House realize they have no credibility about anything? Nobody believes your dumb ass. They met. Of course they met.
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the best part about this whole thing is that they did it to themselves. Even if some future allegations of misconduct are untrue or out of context, everyone will believe they are true.
 
D

Deleted member 1159

Unconfirmed Member
They're going to deny, deny, deny, then excuse it as "so what? Lots of people do that!" while ignoring the implications of their previous denials (i.e. this was inappropriate and perhaps a 'minor treason')

It's as formulaic as a Power Rangers episode.
 
W

WorldofMiku

Banned
Thaedolus said:
They're going to deny, deny, deny, then excuse it as "so what? Lots of people do that!" while ignoring the implications of their previous denials (i.e. this was inappropriate and perhaps a 'minor treason')

It's as formulaic as a Power Rangers episode.
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Urgh. This is too much. :(
 
Whompa02

Whompa02

Member
"They may have met for about 5 minutes"

Bitch please I can get someone's phone number in less than 5 minutes...

I cant wait till this shit blows up and this nutjob gets himself out of power.
 
V

Vagabundo

Member
Lying bag of pretzels. The lot of them....

I do hope there is a mobile phone video of him chatting away to the ambassador somewhere. Another nail in his impeachment.
 
SaviourMK2

SaviourMK2

Member
if the White House says it didnt happen, it happened.
They have zero credibility.

Dare I say their credibility is in the negatives?
 
X

x24hrs2livex

Banned
Is this real life? Like this is seriously happening? Just how? How do they keep getting caught? These are the worst fucking criminals ever.
 
D

Dr.Acula

Banned
To me, "meeting" suggests scheduling something, sitting down, discussing matters of substance, etc. Just being in the same room as someone and maybe shaking their hand in front of press doesn't rise to that level for me. Now of course, if it turns out they made time before or after the speech, that would be a big deal, but I'm not reading that anywhere. This seems like a really lame "gotcha" when we have stuff like Trump's business ties or his surrogates having significant meetings with Russian officials.
 
H

hydragonwarrior

Member
Thaedolus said:
They're going to deny, deny, deny, then excuse it as "so what? Lots of people do that!" while ignoring the implications of their previous denials (i.e. this was inappropriate and perhaps a 'minor treason')

It's as formulaic as a Power Rangers episode.
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If only we can get Trump to say "minor treason"
 
R

rjinaz

Member
Dr.Acula said:
To me, "meeting" suggests scheduling something, sitting down, discussing matters of substance, etc. Just being in the same room as someone and maybe shaking their hand in front of press doesn't rise to that level for me. Now of course, if it turns out they made time before or after the speech, that would be a big deal, but I'm not reading that anywhere. This seems like a really lame "gotcha" when we have stuff like Trump's business ties or his surrogates having significant meetings with Russian officials.
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I don't think Republicans would be giving Hillary the same benefit of the doubt. I would guess Trump would be the loudest of them all. That said, this all could have been avoided if Trump just said from the get go, yeah I shook his hand that one time. That he keeps lying about ever even seeing these people or knowing who they are is what is causing the scrutiny.
 
Link

Link

The Autumn Wind
Dr.Acula said:
To me, "meeting" suggests scheduling something, sitting down, discussing matters of substance, etc. Just being in the same room as someone and maybe shaking their hand in front of press doesn't rise to that level for me. Now of course, if it turns out they made time before or after the speech, that would be a big deal, but I'm not reading that anywhere. This seems like a really lame "gotcha" when we have stuff like Trump's business ties or his surrogates having significant meetings with Russian officials.
Click to expand...
Even if it's nothing, Trump deserves every bit of baseless gossip thrown his way. He wants to play this shitty game? This is what he gets.
 
E

Empyrean Heaven

Member
The back-and-forth between the two sides never ceases to amaze me.

Trump met with Russian ambassador: Totally false! Fake news!

Off the wall story about Obama bugging Trump Tower: It's totally real! It happened!
 
S

Slime

Banned
MetalGearZed said:
Just read a Twitter thread on this.
https://twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/845089192438829056
pretty interesting
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A lot of people are suggesting ignoring this line of thinking because of the messenger, but I think the details are worth looking into regardless.

It's confirmed that the Russian, Italian and Singaporean ambassadors met with Trump and his campaign the night of his first foreign policy speech after securing the nomination.

The source here is the host of the speech, the Center for the National Interest, a think tank whose board of directors includes Putin allies Dimitri Simes and Richard Burt:

Other participants included Senator Jeff Sessions, several Members of the House of Representatives and the ambassadors of Italy, the Philippines, Russia and Singapore.
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https://cftni.org/recent-events/donald-trump-delivers-foreign-policy-speech/

The current Italian ambassador to the US is Armando Varricchio, who during his previous ambassadorship to Serbia was listed as part of the delegation of the Intesa Sanpaolo Group:

The delegation of Intesa Sanpaolo Group, including Mr. Giovanni Boccolini, head on International Division, Mrs. Draginja Đurić, president of the Executive Board of Banca Intesa Beograd, Mr. Gyorgy Suranyi, president of the Board of Directors of Banca Intesa Beograd, and Mr. Armando Varricchio, Italian Ambassador to Serbia was hosted by Mr. Mlađan Dinkić, Serbian Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy and Regional Development, Mr. Boris Tadić, president of the Republic of Serbia and Mr. Radovan Jelašić, Governor of the National Bank of Serbia.
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http://www.bancaintesa.rs/media-room/news.1660.html?newsId=317

The Rosneft deal went through a Singapore investment company, which was leant money by Intesa SanPaolo:

More than a month after Russia announced one of its biggest privatizations since the 1990s, selling a 19.5 percent stake in its giant oil company Rosneft, it still isn't possible to determine from public records the full identities of those who bought it.

The stake was sold for 10.2 billion euros to a Singapore investment vehicle that Rosneft said was a 50/50 joint venture between Qatar and the Swiss oil trading firm Glencore.

...

In addition, public records show the ownership structure of the stake ultimately includes a Cayman Islands company whose beneficial owners cannot be traced.

And while Italian bank Intesa SanPaolo leant the Singapore vehicle 5.2 billion euros to fund the deal, and Qatar put in 2.5 billion, the sources of funding for nearly a quarter of the purchase price have not been disclosed by any of the parties.

"The main question in relation to this transaction, as ever, still sounds like this: Who is the real buyer of a 19.5 percent stake in Rosneft?" Sergey Aleksashenko, a former deputy head of Russia's central bank, wrote in a blog last week.
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http://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-rosneft-privatisation-insight-idUSKBN1582OH
 
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