Sessions has now confirmed he met with the Russian ambassador on two occasions. The first time was at the Republican national convention in July, when Trump formally accepted the party’s nomination. There Sessions delivered a speech at an event for ambassadors sponsored by the Heritage Foundation.
The second occasion was in the senator’s office on 8 September, exactly two months before the presidential election and amid accusations of a Russian cyber-attack. Sessions said Kislyak had requested the meeting and the senator’s staff made the arrangements. Sessions said they discussed his first trip to Russia in 1993, their religious convictions, terrorism and Ukraine, but said he did not recall “any specific political discussions”.
At Sessions’s judiciary committee hearing on 10 January, he was
by the Minnesota Democratic senator Al Franken what he would do if it were discovered that an official associated with the Trump campaign had communicated with the Russian government in the course of the 2016 election cycle.
“I’m not aware of any of those activities,” Sessions replied. “I have been called a surrogate at a time or two in that campaign and I did not have communications with the Russians.”
On Thursday, Franken called that remark “at best, extremely misleading” and said Sessions should clarify his remarks under oath to the judiciary committee.
During the press conference, Sessions said he was “taken aback” by Franken’s line of questioning. “In retrospect, I should have slowed down and said, but I did meet one Russian official a couple of times, that would be the Russian ambassador.”
