Senate Intel Committee to Question Jared Kushner About Meetings with Russian Ambassador, Bank Official

The New York Times reports that the Senate Intelligence Committee will be questioning President Trump’s son-in-law and senior White House advisor Jared Kushner concerning meetings he held with Russian officials close to the Kremlin, including an executive with Russia’s state-owned development bank, who claims he met with Kushner “in his capacity as the then-chief executive of Kushner Companies, his family’s sprawling real estate empire.”

From Jo Becker, Matthew Rosenberg, and Maggie Haberman in the New York Times:

Until now, the White House had acknowledged only an early December meeting between [Russian ambassador Sergey I.] Kislyak and Mr. Kushner, which occurred at Trump Tower and was also attended by Michael T. Flynn, who would briefly serve as the national security adviser.

Later that month, though, Mr. Kislyak requested a second meeting, which Mr. Kushner asked a deputy to attend in his stead, officials said. At Mr. Kislyak’s request, Mr. Kushner later met with Sergey N. Gorkov, the chief of Vnesheconombank, which the United States placed on its sanctions list after President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia annexed Crimea and began meddling in Ukraine.

A White House spokeswoman, Hope Hicks, confirmed those meetings, saying in an interview that nothing of consequence occurred and portraying them as routine diplomatic encounters that went nowhere. But Mr. Gorkov, who previously served as deputy chairman of the board at Sberbank, Russia’s largest state-owned bank, said in a statement issued by his bank that he met with Mr. Kushner in his capacity as the then-chief executive of Kushner Companies, his family’s sprawling real estate empire.

…

Mr. Kushner had not yet stepped aside as chief executive of Kushner Companies, which was trying to attract investment for the company’s crown jewel, an overleveraged Manhattan office tower on Fifth Avenue. The company was in the midst of negotiations to redevelop the building with Anbang Insurance Group, a Chinese company with ties to the Beijing government.

Read the rest here.