Page 123 in the report and 131 on the PDF
This is a very lengthy assessment and will require more than one entry to cover all of it.
I might add as reading this section of the Special Counsel's Report the facts that Trump objected to funding Ukraine's military needs even as a candidate. Withholding the funding of Ukraine while intimidating the new Ukraine president was on the agenda the entire time.
Released Trump Memo (click here)
6. Events at the Republican National Convention
Trump Campaign officials met with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak during the week of the Republican National Convention. The evidence indicates that those interactions were brief and non-substantive. During platform committee meetings immediately before the Convention, J.D. Gordon, a senior Campaign advisor on policy and national security, diluted a proposed amendment to the Republican Party platform expressing support for providing “lethal” assistance to Ukraine in response to
Russian aggression.
...J.D. Gordon (click here) also told NPR that Page as well George Papadopoulos, who recently pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his own Russia contacts, were marginal figures in the Trump world. Both men served as members of the then-candidate's foreign policy team, but they were not central figures with a meaningful voice, he said."They were peripheral members of a relatively peripheral advisory committee," Gordon told NPR by text message. "They had no campaign email addresses, no assigned office space, no building passes, no responsibilities and very little access to campaign leadership."...
Perhaps party platforms are not taken as seriously as they should be, but, this is a direct benefit to Russia in an overt way that Putin could measure Trump's influence in the RNC, hence elected Republicans.
Gordon requested that platform committee personnel revise the proposed amendment to state that only “appropriate” assistance be provided to Ukraine. The original sponsor of the “lethal” assistance amendment stated that Gordon told her (the sponsor) that he was on the phone with candidate Trump in connection with his request to dilute the language. Gordon denied making that statement to the sponsor, although he acknowledged it was possible he mentioned having previously spoken to the candidate about the subject matter. The investigation did not establish that Gordon spoke to or was directed by the candidate to make that proposal. Gordon said that he sought the change because he believed the proposed language was inconsistent with Trump’s position on Ukraine.
Trump's corruption of this party and the country to benefit Russia is obvious and never changed once in office.
a. Ambassador Kislyak’s Encounters with Senator Sessions and J.D. Gordon the Week of the RNC
In July 2016, Senator Sessions and Gordon spoke at the Global Partners in Diplomacy event, a conference co-sponsored by the State Department and the Heritage Foundation held in Cleveland, Ohio the same week as the Republican National Convention (RNC or “Convention”).775 Approximately 80 foreign ambassadors to the United States, including Kislyak, were invited to the conference.776
On July 20, 2016, Gordon and Sessions delivered their speeches at the conference.777 In his speech, Gordon stated in pertinent part that the United States should have better relations with Russia.778 During Sessions’s speech, he took questions from the audience, one of which may have been asked by Kislyak.779 When the speeches concluded, several ambassadors lined up to greet the speakers.780 Gordon shook hands with Kislyak and reiterated that he had meant what he said in the speech about improving U.S.-Russia relations.781 Sessions separately spoke with between six and 12 ambassadors, including Kislyak.782 Although Sessions stated during interviews with the Office that he had no specific recollection of what he discussed with Kislyak, he believed that the two spoke for only a few minutes and that they would have exchanged pleasantries and said some things about U.S.-Russia relations.783
Later that evening, Gordon attended a reception as part of the conference.784 Gordon ran into Kislyak as the two prepared plates of food, and they decided to sit at the same table to eat.785 They were joined at that table by the ambassadors from Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, and by Trump Campaign advisor Carter Page.786 As they ate, Gordon and Kislyak talked for what Gordon estimated to have been three to five minutes, during which Gordon again mentioned that he meant what he said in his speech about improving U.S.-Russia relations.787
In preparation for the 2016 Convention, foreign policy advisors to the Trump Campaign, working with the Republican National Committee, reviewed the 2012 Convention’s foreign policy platform to identify divergence between the earlier platform and candidate Trump’s positions.788 The Campaign team discussed toning down language from the 2012 platform that identified Russia as the country’s number one threat, given the candidate’s belief that there needed to be better U.S. relations with Russia.789 The RNC Platform Committee sent the 2016 draft platform to the National Security and Defense Platform Subcommittee on July 10, 2016, the evening before its first meeting to propose amendments.790
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Footnote 775 Gordon 8/29/17 302, at 9;
Sessions 1/17/18 302, at 22;
Allan Smith, (click here) We Now Know More About why Jeff Sessions and a Russian Ambassador Crossed Paths at the Republican Convention, Business Insider (Mar. 2, 2017).
Sessions lies a lot more than about Trump, he also lies about his connections to White Supremacists as a speaker at their meetings. I believe one took place in California.
...During his Senate confirmation hearing, (click here) Sessions did not mention the pair of discussions in an exchange with Democratic Sen. Al Franken of Minnesota. Franken did not ask Sessions whether he specifically spoke with Russian operatives, but Sessions, in answering an unrelated question, said he did not have any communications with "the Russians."
"If there is any evidence that anyone affiliated with the Trump campaign communicated with the Russian government in the course of this campaign, what will you do?" Franken asked.
"Sen. Franken, I'm not aware of any of those activities," Sessions responded. "I have been called a surrogate at a time or two in that campaign and I did not have communications with the Russians, and I'm unable to comment on it."...
Footnote 776 Gordon 8/29/17 302, at 9;
Laura DeMarco, (click here) Global Cleveland and Sen. Bob Corker Welcome International Republican National Convention Guests, Cleveland Plain Dealer (July 20, 2016).
Footnote 777 Gordon 8/29/17 302, at 9; Sessions 1/17/18 302, at 22.
Footnote 778 Gordon 8/29/17 302, at 9.
Footnote 779 Sessions 1/17/18 302, at 22; Luff 1/30/18 302, at 3.
Footnote 780 Gordon 8/29/17 302, at 9; Luff 1/30/18 302, at 3.
Footnote 781 Gordon 8/29/17 302, at 9.
Footnote 782 Sessions 1/17/18 302, at 22; Luff 1/30/18 302, at 3; see also Volume I, Section IV.A.4.b, supra (explaining that Sessions and Kislyak may have met three months before this encounter during a reception held on April 26, 2016, at the Mayflower Hotel).
Footnote 783 Sessions 1/17/18 302, at 22.
Footnote 784 Gordon 8/29/17 302, at 9-10.
Footnote 785 Gordon 8/29/17 302, at 9-10.
Footnote 786 Gordon 8/29/17 302, at 10; see also Volume I, Section IV.A.3.d, supra (explaining that Page acknowledged meeting Kislyak at this event).
Footnote 787 Gordon 8/29/17 302, at 10.
Footnote 788 Gordon 8/29/17 302, at 10.
Footnote 789 Gordon 8/29/17 302, at 10.
Footnote 790 Gordon 8/29/17 302, at 10; Hoff 5/26/17 302, at 1-2.
Continued in the next entry.
