Democrats have tried to use the Russia probe to take down Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
Chuck Schumer was one of the ringleaders of their strategy of accusing Sessions of lying before Congress.
But Sessions just produced one bombshell email that shut Schumer down for good.
Democrats have been hounding Jeff Sessions over testimony he gave Congress where he said he did not have any contacts with Russian officials in his security clearance application.
Sessions had met with the Russian Ambassador – as well as other nations’ Ambassadors – but that was in his capacity as Senator from Alabama.
Schumer claimed this amounted to perjury.
The Washington Examiner reports:
“With new revelations raising questions about Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ prior testimony about the Trump campaign’s contact with Russians, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said on Thursday that perjury could be in Sessions’ future.
“It’s serious stuff,” Schumer told MSNBC host Rachel Maddow after she laid out the history of Sessions’ evolving testimony about his communications with Russians and whether he knew the Trump campaign had been in contact them. Sessions, previously a senator from Alabama, served as a foreign policy adviser to President Trump’s campaign.
“Perjury is a very careful standard, but it’s something that would be looked at,” Schumer added.”
Schumer on Sessions' evolving Russia testimony: Perjury is something that would be looked at.#Maddow pic.twitter.com/pgYGGH6B1t
— Maddow Blog (@MaddowBlog) November 3, 2017
But there was one email that proved Sessions innocent.
The FBI informed him when he was completing his security clearance forms that he did not have to disclose the meetings with the Russian Ambassador because they occurred in his capacity as a government official and not a member of the Trump campaign.
CNN reports:
“A newly released document shows that the FBI told an aide to Attorney General Jeff Sessions that Sessions wasn’t required to disclose foreign contacts that occurred in the course of carrying out his government duties when he was a senator.
The FBI email from March bolsters the explanation by the Justice Department for why Sessions didn’t disclose contacts with the Russian ambassador in his application for a US security clearance. When the omission of the foreign contacts on the form was first reported by CNN in May, the Justice Department said Sessions’ office was advised by the FBI that he didn’t need to disclose the meetings.
An FBI agent, whose name isn’t made public in the document released by the bureau, was responding in March to a query from Sessions’ assistant. The assistant sought confirmation of what she said was an earlier conversation on the matter. At the time, news of Sessions’ Russian contacts had recently become public and prompted fierce political criticism.
The agent didn’t recall the earlier conversation but affirmed that “he was not required to list foreign government contacts while in official government business unless he developed personal relationships from such contacts.”
The agent sent an email to his supervisor describing the new inquiry from Sessions’ assistant.”
For months, the media and Democrats hyped the revelation that Sessions did not disclose his meeting with the Russians as a major bombshell.
They claimed it proved perjury.
But just like many of the Russia stories the media has published, it turned out to be a big, fat, nothing burger.