{"id":240523,"date":"2017-07-12T10:36:00","date_gmt":"2017-07-12T14:36:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/?p=240523"},"modified":"2017-07-13T16:18:16","modified_gmt":"2017-07-13T20:18:16","slug":"donald-jr-s-russian-honey-pot-meeting-was-completely-within-the-law","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2017\/07\/12\/donald-jr-s-russian-honey-pot-meeting-was-completely-within-the-law\/","title":{"rendered":"Donald Jr.\u2019s Russian Honey Pot Meeting Was Completely within the Law"},"content":{"rendered":"

RUSH: I have a couple pieces here from people who have written about this episode, this latest episode, which, again, I\u2019m sorry if this appears redundant, but I feel a compulsion here to say a couple of things I believe to be key over and over again to drive the point home.<\/p>\n

The reaction, coupled with a column today in the Washington Post by Dan Balz, tells me this is it; they\u2019ve got nothing but this. All that\u2019s preceded this — all the bombshells, all the blockbusters, all of the Washington Post, New York Times, CNN stories — nothing. They\u2019ve got it all. This is it, folks. This is the story. And Dan Balz\u2019s piece, “A Revelation Unlike Any Other in the Russia Investigation.<\/a>”<\/p>\n

\"\"I wouldn\u2019t go so far as to say that the media sees this as their last-gasp chance, because they\u2019re not going to stop. I think this is the one of all in the past nine months that they think might stick. None of the others have. And so they\u2019re giddy. They\u2019re not able to help themselves.<\/p>\n

Here is Robert Barnes at a website called LawNewz on: “Why Donald Trump Jr. is Innocent. Period.<\/a>” A pull quote: “Hence, legally, Donald Trump Jr. taking a meeting at the request of a family friend, to hear someone wanting to volunteer information about your Dad\u2019s adversary, can legally be no crime. He did what a loyal son, honorable friend, and smart advocate would do — hear them out. Anyone who thinks that\u2019s a crime is the one who needs to have their values checked.<\/p>\n

“Donald Trump Jr. took a meeting from someone claiming evidence of foreign corruption by Hillary Clinton.” By the way, that\u2019s important to point out. What Donald Trump Jr. was told was not that the Russians wanted to help Trump win. They had high-level indicting kind of news on Hillary.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t, “Hey, the Russians want to help your dad win. The Russians want to conspire and collude with you.” It was, “You know, I got a friend who\u2019s the son of a powerful oligarch who says somebody\u2019s got some really damning information on Hillary that you ought to hear about. It comes from the highest levels of the Russian government.”<\/p>\n

“Well, okay. We\u2019ll hear what this is.” We don\u2019t know what Donald Trump Jr. would have done with it because it was never given! There wasn\u2019t any high-level information. Can you say “setup”?<\/p>\n

“Donald Trump Jr. took a meeting from someone claiming evidence of foreign corruption by Hillary Clinton. The meeting proved useless. Donald Trump Jr. released the emails leading to the meeting. It is clear from the documents and statements of all involved that Donald Trump Jr. did nothing wrong. He broke no law.<\/p>\n

“This isn\u2019t like Hillary Clinton\u2019s husband soliciting donations disguised as speech payments, travel costs, and charity work, while Hillary was Secretary of State. Based solely on the fact the source of the information was a Yeltsin-era prosecutor from Russia, a few anti-Trump lawyers falsely accuse Trump Jr. of a crime.<\/p>\n

“American law imposed no restrictions on foreign donations for almost all of its history until that ethical icon Lyndon Baines Johnson was President.” Did you know that? Foreigners could donate to presidential campaigns, they could, until LBJ. And why do you think that is? Well, \u2019cause LBJ was so ethical. (laughing)<\/p>\n

“Then, after Watergate, those restrictions on foreign funding of American elections was mostly enacted through incorporation of Watergate-era reforms. Exceptions always existed: only cash donations, or the like, were prohibited and green card holders exempt. … The Code of Federal Regulations makes the law immunizing Trump Jr.\u2019s actions precisely clear: any foreign national individual may volunteer personal services to a federal candidate or federal political committee without making a contribution. The law provides this volunteer ‘exemption\u2019 as long as the individual performing the service is not compensated by anyone on the campaign.”<\/p>\n

Here we are back to the quid pro quo. Nobody has ever found one! In any of this, there has never been a quid pro quo. You can find them all over the place with Hillary Clinton and uranium and Ukraine. You can find quid pro quos with Hillary Clinton, 250 grand for a 20-minute speech to Goldman Sachs and every other banker on earth. Ditto, Bill Clinton.<\/p>\n

You can find quid pro quos with Mrs. Clinton and that foundation selling influence to the White House before she even got there. But you don\u2019t have any quid pro quos with Donald Trump, and you don\u2019t have any with Donald Trump Jr. What would have made something like this a crime under current law would have required money in some way, shape, manner, form. There wasn\u2019t any here.<\/p>\n

\"\"This is James Robins, USA Today: “Donald Trump Jr. Was Within His Rights to Meet With Russian Lawyer<\/a> — What if there had been truly damaging information about Hillary Clinton?” What if there had been some of that and what if it had been imparted. Let\u2019s stop and think about that for a second. Let\u2019s play a hypothetical.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s say that the honey pot turned out to actually be a lawyer like she was reputed to be and let\u2019s say the honey pot did have a message from the highest levels of the Russian government. And let\u2019s say the honey pot showed up at the meeting and told Donald Trump Jr. what that information was. And let\u2019s say that that information was very damaging to Hillary Clinton. Do you think a journalist would invoke the public\u2019s right to know, to be entitled to what it is? You don\u2019t?<\/p>\n

Okay. Let\u2019s turn it around. Let\u2019s see. Chelsea Clinton, after a few hours of courageous tweeting, gets a phone call from a music producer in the U.K., gets an email, claiming that somebody has damaging information on Donald Trump from the highest levels of the Russian government. And they want to send a lawyer from Russia, from Moscow to meet with Chelsea to impart the information. And let\u2019s say Chelsea takes the meeting, and let\u2019s say the lawyer does have some damaging news about Donald Trump.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s say that they\u2019ve got video of prostitutes urinating on Obama\u2019s bed in Moscow. Do you think journalists would invoke the public\u2019s right to know about that? Damn straight they would. They wouldn\u2019t be talking about Chelsea Clinton committing treason, would they? No, no, no. Chelsea Clinton, make her vice president, this woman is showing how classy and how qualified she is. She was able to dig up dirt on Trump, they would say. And they would be praising her to smithereens.<\/p>\n

“The saying in the Watergate days was that ‘it\u2019s not the crime but the cover-up.\u2019 These days, you don\u2019t need a crime or a cover-up to trigger outsized political outrage, just a heavy dose of bad optics.” Which is what this is.<\/p>\n

James Robbins at USA Today says: “This story is hardly as inane as the collective furor that has been generated around the Russia issue writ large. Although four intelligence agencies concluded the Russian government attempted to influence the 2016 election, there is no evidence that any of these attempts succeeded.”<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s my point. You know, everybody\u2019s running around and saying, as though it is common knowledge and inarguable that everybody knows the Russians attempted to affect the election. The Russians interfered. The Russians did. And then when you ask \u2019em, what did they do? You know what the answer you get is? No, no. They have an answer for you. The answer, “The Russians got Podesta\u2019s emails and gave \u2019em to WikiLeaks.” That\u2019s it.<\/p>\n

Now, Julian Assange at WikiLeaks has denied from the get-go that it was the Russians that gave him Podesta\u2019s emails. But that\u2019s it. That\u2019s it. We know that somebody hacked the DNC computers, and they won\u2019t let any forensics analysis of those computers take place. We know that the Democrats rigged the election against Crazy Bernie. (interruption) What do you mean, what could have happened? Oh, you mean Seth Rich? I didn\u2019t say that. Don\u2019t lump me in that crowd. I know they went nuts when people started to go — we don\u2019t even have to go there. Everybody thinks the Russians succeeded! Everybody thinks the Russians succeeded!<\/p>\n

This is what gets me. It galls me. And I still don\u2019t really know how they did it. What I know is they didn\u2019t affect votes in any way, shape, manner or form. I don\u2019t care if they tried, they try all the time, everyone does, but they did not succeed at that. The election was not illegitimate. The election was not fraudulent. The outcome was not the result of cheating or fraud. Well, the Democrats might have voter fraud, but not the Russians.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s never been anything to this story, as far as I\u2019m concerned. That\u2019s why these bombshells don\u2019t affect me. We have a Trump loyalist on the staff here who was really worried on Monday over this Donald Trump Jr. story. “This worries me,” the loyalist said.<\/p>\n

\"\"Why? How is this any different? There\u2019s still nothing here. What\u2019s being alleged didn\u2019t happen. “Yeah, but he looked like he was prepared to take the meeting” But it didn\u2019t happen. Yeah, he took the meeting under pretext, but it\u2019s so much ado about nothing. The fact that they\u2019re trying to make this into something so big is quite telling.<\/p>\n

Now the honey pot, the honey pot. We got a lot of interesting news about the honey pot out there today. Her name is Natalia Veselnitskaya. It takes a seasoned and highly trained broadcast specialist to pronounce that name with no stuttering and pauses and rehearsals. Natalia Veselnitskaya. And she is pictured — I\u2019ve seen it at two different websites now — pictured with Obama officials in Washington June 14th, 2016.<\/p>\n

Does that date — when did she meet with Trump Jr.? June the 9th. Five days later, she\u2019s in the front row at a congressional hearing. She was a guest of former Obama administration Russian ambassador Michael McFaul for a House of Representatives hearing on U.S. policy toward Russia.<\/p>\n

She is pictured seated in the front row directly behind the ambassador to Russia, Michael McFaul. It was the House Foreign Affairs Committee. It\u2019s June 14th. It\u2019s five days after the reported meeting that she had with Donald Trump Jr.<\/p>\n

Ambassador McFaul was publicly discussing the Russia conspiracy narrative in the media. He appeared on a bunch of MSNBC broadcasts during the 2016 campaign. Immediately after the election, Ms. Natalia Veselnitskaya was initially denied an entry visa into the U.S. in 2016. She appealed her situation to the U.S. District Court of New York. She was granted a parole letter allowing her to enter the U.S. on behalf of a client.<\/p>\n

So what is the nature, if any — I mean, did she just happen to show up in a congressional hearing where the former Obama ambassador to Russia was under questioning, five days after meeting with Donald Trump Jr.? What\u2019s going on here? What connection is there between Natalia Veselnitskaya and President Obama\u2019s ambassador to Russia? Why would there be any relationship?<\/p>\n

She has to get special permission to enter the country for this meeting? Somebody at the U.S. Southern District of New York, the federal court, made this happen. Who was the U.S. attorney then? Why, that would be Preet Bharara. See how we can play the conspiracy game here. That means Chuck Schumer might have been involved. (laughing)<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: This is Frank in Fresno. Thank you for calling, Frank. Great to have you on the EIB Network. Hi.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Boy, I better go buy a lottery ticket today \u2019cause this is my lucky day talking to you, Rush. Twenty year dittos. Let me get right to the point. It\u2019s funny you said Chuck Schumer. I recently saw a photo of Chuck Schumer standing next to Vladimir Putin while Chuck Schumer was holding a drink. This is on a website called Judicial Watch. I find it rather interesting and especially now that you just mention maybe Chuck Schumer might have had something to do with this Russian lawyer.<\/p>\n

\"\"RUSH: I was trying to illustrate the way conspiracies are put together on the left. But look, it\u2019s an interesting question. This honey pot, Natalia Veselnitskaya, she\u2019s not legally permitted in the country. She has to seek an exception. She gets it from the Feds at the U.S. attorney\u2019s office Southern District of New York. At the time, the U.S. attorney in that district was Preet Bharara, who was a Chuck Schumer aficionado and loyalist.<\/p>\n

But this is the woman — we have the British music publicist — have you seen a picture of this guy, by the way, this Rob Goldstone guy? This guy posts selfies of himself all over. He wears Russian general caps with his plaid work shirt. He looks like an absolute goon, one of these crazy people, and he\u2019s obviously seeking fame. The kid involved here is the Michael Buble of Russia. That is the son of the Russian oligarch that this publicist knows. Emin is his name, and Emin was the guy who called Goldstone and says, “Hey, we got somebody that has some really damning information on Hillary. We need to get it to Donald Trump Jr. We got this babe coming over there, and we\u2019d like for Trump Jr. to take a meeting with the babe.”<\/p>\n

The babe is the honey pot, this Natalia Veselnitskaya. Well, she can\u2019t legally get into the country at the time. What was she doing in the country anyway? Why was she coming here anyway? She was supposedly banned from the U.S. at the time. So she got a visa or visa extension of some kind from the Obama administration. It seems that she\u2019s connected to Fusion GPS.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a lot to keep track of here. Fusion GPS is intimately involved in the creation of the Trump golden showers dossier, and the honey pot has involvement with those people. That is an interesting side light story to this as well, the Russian dossier and the collusion between Americans and Russians in order for that to happen. And that did not involve collusion with Trump; he was the target of that collusion.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Now, about this connection to Fusion GPS, this is from Circa. It\u2019s a couple days ago. This is a great, great, great news service, John Solomon and Sara Carter<\/a>. Quote, “The president\u2019s legal team said Saturday they believe the entire meeting may have been part of a larger election-year opposition effort aimed at creating the appearance of improper connections between Trump family members and Russia that also included a now-discredited intelligence dossier produced by a former British intelligence agent named Christopher Steele –”<\/p>\n

I\u2019m going to go through this again, too, because we have been making ourselves hoarse trying to tell people about this phony, fake Trump dossier, which has been admitted to by Comey and others and John Brennan CIA as the foundation for all of these phony investigations and libelous, slanderous news stories. A fake, phony dossier.<\/p>\n

And the president\u2019s legal team said Saturday they believed the entire meeting, the attempted setup of the meeting with the honey pot, “Natasha,” and Trump Jr. “may have been part of a larger election-year opposition effort aimed at creating the appearance of improper connections between Trump family members and Russia.<\/p>\n

“The connection drawn by the president\u2019s lawyers between Veselnitskaya and Fusion GPS comes from a letter this spring by the Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Charles Grassley, who disclosed that Fusion GPS also provided litigation support in the Prevezon case. Prevezon also apparently lobbied against the Magnitsky Act, according to Grassley\u2019s letter.”<\/p>\n

\"\"It\u2019s all interconnected. It\u2019s made to look like we have an isolated incident, some guy in the U.K. knows a song stylist in Russia who\u2019s the son of a big oligarch who knows Putin! And he calls the publicist in the U.K., Goldstone, says (paraphrasing), “Hey, we got some high-level information on Hillary Clinton, how corrupt she is, and we\u2019ve got a lawyer coming over. We\u2019d love for you to meet her and have her impart the news.”<\/p>\n

And, in fact, this woman is much more entwined and involved in the Obama administration. She\u2019s not just some random person chosen to carry a message. And the odds are we can even say the nature of the evidence and compare it to the seriousness of the charge. There hasn\u2019t been anything up to now that has been worth anything legally in incriminating Donald Trump or anybody in his campaign. There\u2019s nothing. Everything\u2019s wrapped up into this.<\/p>\n

And it\u2019s just the latest in a long line of things being made to look like it\u2019s out of the blue and totally independent and related to nothing that\u2019s come before it, and I don\u2019t believe that. I don\u2019t believe it\u2019s a standalone meeting, standalone issue, standalone event that has no ties to anything that has happened prior. I think it\u2019s all part of this ongoing effort to get Trump thrown out of office. I think it\u2019s all part of the silent coup.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s the primary reason I\u2019m not among the crowd biting my fingernails, “Oh, no, oh, no, this looks like it will be the one. Oh, no.” I haven\u2019t even once considered that there\u2019s anything to this, other than trickery. But that\u2019s just me, folks, because I don\u2019t trust \u2019em. I think they lie through their teeth. I know the left. I know the media. I know how they operate. I know what their objective here is. I know what their agenda here is. And when I see the agenda in action, why am I all of a sudden gonna change my mind about what it is after a-nine-month steady diet of it?<\/p>\n

Anyway, Mark in Joplin, Missouri, as we head back to phones. I\u2019m glad you waited. How you doing, sir?<\/p>\n

CALLER: I\u2019m doing well, sir. Mega dittos, Rush, 25-year listener.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Thank you, sir.<\/p>\n

\"\"CALLER: My point is, I\u2019ve heard some people criticize Trump Jr. that instead of taking the meeting, that he should have turned it over I assume to the Justice Department. Well, who the hell is he gonna give it to, Loretta Lynch? James Comey? Who\u2019s he gonna give it to? Who\u2019s he gonna give the information to?<\/p>\n

RUSH: He\u2019s asking an interesting question here. By the way, this is not something that Donald Trump Jr. would ever say in public. His point here — it\u2019s a good point out there, Mark. His point is that Trump Jr. critics, the holier-than-thou, never done anything wrong people in the media — that\u2019s another thing that bothers me, they sit there in moral judgment of everybody else as though they are clean and pure as the wind-driven snow. They\u2019ve never done anything untoward, and they sit here and they pounce and pronounce judgment on everybody else\u2019s behavior.<\/p>\n

But what ol\u2019 Mark here is saying, okay, you\u2019re Donald Trump Jr., you take the meeting, the meeting is supposedly about high-level information, bad news on Hillary, and now the media\u2019s saying, “He should have immediately called the FBI.” And left-wing lawyers, “He should have called the FBI. This is treason. He\u2019s got a foreign government calling offering to do harm to our Democrat presidential candidate. He should call the FBI.”<\/p>\n

And Mark\u2019s point is, call the FBI, call James Comey, call Loretta Lynch, call the Obama Justice Department with this? If you\u2019re in the Trump campaign, aren\u2019t you gonna be a little bit suspicious of the Obama Justice Department? Now, that\u2019s not something Donald Trump Jr. would ever admit to on TV. Let\u2019s say he\u2019s under intense interrogation by Sean Hannity on the Fox News Channel last night. “Why didn\u2019t you call the FBI? Why don\u2019t you do the right thing, Trump Jr.?”<\/p>\n

“Are you kidding me, Sean? Are you kidding me? You think we\u2019re gonna call Loretta Lynch or James Comey with this?” He would never say that, if that\u2019s what his thinking was. It would never happen. Let\u2019s listen. We have Trump Jr. on Hannity last night. This is audio sound bite number 3. And Hannity\u2019s question, “Okay, this email comes in. What are you thinking when you get that email?”<\/p>\n