Page 531 - Elect News Today

The news is that jared kushner, the son-in-law of the president elect at that point, called up the russians or contacted the russians and said hey, lets get together and chat. i want to talk about some things and by the way, lets do it at your secure facility over your secure system. that looks a little unusual, frankly, to a lot of people including senator mccain as we just heard. if the russians were saying hey, you guys just got elected. lets establish a chat. kushner and trump are new at the...

Monitoring and establishing a back channel with a sworn enemy of the united states, who was actively disrupting our effors s in the military in the middle east. is that bad judgment? is that a bad thing? back channels are completely normal. they happen all the time. reagan did them, obama did them so im not so sure why setting up a back channel with the russians is somehow out of bounds. >> well, heres one key difference. in october, months before this latest meeting and it was one of 18 separat...

Relationships with crucial partners, you know, u.k. and israel come to mind, and this is particularly serious now because in my experience 50 plus years in intelligence, i know over time when we depended more on friends and allies for sharing information and intelligence, particularly with respect to terrorism, so i know secretary kelly takes -- you know, takes this quite seriously and he should. legal definition on whats treason, ill leave that to the lawyers but just on the intelligence busine...

Thanks for being with us. how significant is this discussion of kushners discussion of a back channel to the kremlin in your mind? >> it is very significant on two or three levels. first of all, even if it is innocent in nature, it creates yet more smoke. and people are choking on the smoke thats already out there. it could be very problematic, depending on how far he wanted to go with these back channels. it is not unusual for administration-elect, personnel, to go to different countries, go to...

So im not so sure why setting up a back channel with the russians is somehow out of bounds. >> well, heres one key difference. in october, months before this latest meeting and it was one of 18 separate contacts that we now know of between the trump campaign and russia, our primary adversary in the world, in october, the collective judgment of the 17 intelligence agencies had been that russia had been taking active measures to interfere in our elections. so we know that that was happening in oct...

I was the russia person. i then went to the national security council to do the russia portfolio in 2009. we never spoke to ambassador kislyak once during that period. i got to know him pretty well when i worked in the white house. that was my job. the very fact that they were meeting with him already raises my eyebrows, let alone the content which you have just been talking about the last few minutes. >> youre saying the timeline, even in a normal environment, of using the transition period to ...

Transition team in 2008, i was the russia person. i then went to the national security council. we never spoke to ambassador kislyak once during that period. i got to know him well when i worked in the white house, that was my job. the very fact that they were meeting with him already raises my eyebrows, let alone the content which you have just been talking about the last few minutes. >> youre saying the timeline, even in a normal environment, of using the transition period to sort of rush to m...

>> steve hall, youre a former cia russia expert, with this sort of alleged communication system, with the russians, through the russian embassy in washington, involving a top adviser to the president elect of the united states, would that be a. >> the short answer to your question is it would be unprecedented. i dont understand why it is that jared kushner, if he wants some sort of -- thats what were calling it so ill stay with that, why if jared kushner wants some back channel back to moscow, w...

Lets start with the first one. i was also part of the obama transition team in 2008, i was the russia person. i then went to the national security council. we never spoke to ambassador kislyak once during that period. i got to know him well when i worked in the white house, that was my job. the very fact that they were meeting with him already raises my eyebrows, let alone the content which you have just been talking about the last few minutes. >> youre saying the timeline, even in a normal envi...

Kislyak once during that period. i got to know him well when i worked in the white house, that was my job. the very fact that they were meeting with him already raises my eyebrows, let alone the content which you have just been talking about the last few minutes. >> youre saying the timeline, even in a normal environment, of using the transition period to sort of rush to meet with the russian ambassador and in this case also a banker strikes you as odd? >> very odd. i want to really underscore h...