Russian government in the course of this campaign, what will you do . Senator frank en, ien, im n aware of any of those activities. Ive been called a surrogate a time or two in that campaign and i did not have communication was the russians. He said he didnt have communications with the russians. Then when asked in a written question whether he had been in contact with anyone connected to any part of the russian government about the 2016 election, either before or after the election day, sessions responded no. Now listen to what he said when he recused himself from the russia probe back in march. Let me be clear, i never had meetings with russian operatives or russian intermediaries about the Trump Campaign, and the idea that i was part of a continuing exchange of information during the campaign between trump surrogates and intermediaries for the russian government is totally false. Now, listen to what the attorney general said in the Senate Testimony back in june. Listen to how hes changed what he is saying. I have never met with nor had any conversation with any russians or any foreign officials concerning any type of interference with any campaign or election in the United States. All right. So, sara murray joins us from the white house. First of all, have you reaction to all of this . Reporter we asked the white house for a reaction. We have not heard from them yet on this tonight. Obviously we know that the president has had some concerns about Jeff Sessions recently. He aired them in an interview with the New York Times, mainly lashing out that sessions has recused himself from the russia investigation, which sessions was of course told to do by lawyers at the department of justice. We have a statement tonight from Justice Department spokes woman so im going to read it to you. She says, obviously i cannot comment on the reliability of what Anonymous Sources describe in wholly uncorroborated intelligence intercept that the Washington Post has not seen and that has not been provided to me, but the attorney general stands by his testimony from just last month before the Senate Intelligence committee when he specifically addressed this and said he never met with or had any conversations with any russians or any foreign officials concerning any type of interference with any campaign or election. So thats the statement from the department of justice. Still waiting to see if the white house weighs in on it this evening, but clearly a tough week for Jeff Sessions. Sara, what is interesting about the statement is it says he stands by his amended statement which was in his second time testifying under oath where he said never had contacts with russians about interference in the campaigns or the elections, whereas previously he said never had any Campaign Contacts with the russians, full stop. Reporter well, right. And thats whats continued to dog this white house, right . The fact that they were so adamant, Jeff Sessions, but so many officials in this white house, adamant there was no contact with any russian officials and then you find out drip, drip, drip, there was this meeting, there was that meeting. This obviously has to do with Jeff Sessions conversation in particular with russian ambassad ambassadam bass kiss door. It is the reason Michael Flynn was fired and is no longer serving in this white house. This is the kind of thing that has come back to haunt the west wing over and over again. Also, this could not come at a worse time for Jeff Sessions given what the president said about him to the New York Times the other day . Reporter thats right. Sure, Sarah Huckabee sanders says the president has confidence in sessions, and if he wanted sessions out he would be out. These are difficult comments. If you are anyone serving for the president , if you are someone who decided to serve in government remember, Jeff Sessions gave up a senate seat that was probably safe for him for quite a long time. He was one of the first people to endorse President Trump, and President Trump repaid that by lashing out in the New York Times about how Jeff Sessions was very unfair to him and should have told him at the outset he was going to recuse himself from the russia investigation. If so, the president would have chosen someone else. Like i said, not a great week to be Jeff Sessions. Although at beginning he didnt know he was going to recuse himself. I want to bring in cnn contributor and Washington Post reporter, one of the three names in the byline of the Washington Post story. For his part he has financially supported her organization, the American Union fund. Also with us scott jennings, Maria Cardona and jason miller. I want to focus with you. The report about attorney general, explain what you are reporting tonight. Whats the story . So, you know, we reported back in martha when sessions appeared before the Senate Judiciary committee and was asked the question about, frankly, al franken didnt ask him that question, but his answer was he didnt have any contact communication was the russians. We found out that that wasnt the case, that there was, you know, a meeting at the rnc on the sidelines that he had a meeting with kislyak and there was a second meeting at his office in second. We attended that they attended the same event in april where trump gave his first Foreign Policy speak. I recall. We are trying to figure out what were the contents of these contacts, what were they discussing. So, you know, sessions specifically said he did not discuss Campaign Matters in his march 2nd appearance where he announced his recusal. Right. He was very blunt about that. Well, he was blunt about it when referring to the you know, i guess the july event. He was a little bit less clear when referring to the september event. The bottom line is we wanted to find out, you know, whether that was true. So what we learned is that kizliak reported back to moscow about two conversations in 2016 with sessions, the first one in april, the second one in july, in which he reported that he told moscow they did discuss Campaign Issues. And it is possible and this is based on u. S. Intelligence intercepts correct. You havent heard the intercepts but you have spoken to people who have . Correct. I dont know if they listened or read intelligence reports based on those enter cements. It is possible and you write about this in the article as well, that kizliak is lying, boasting to make himself seem more connected . He could be doing that. He could also be planting false information to throw off u. S. Intelligence analysts, which is a practice. Let me vouch for kizliak. In the past his reporting has appeared to be accurate this is according to what intelligence people you have talked to . According to actually u. S. Diplomats and other officials that dealt with him over the years. Not only that, but we did an earlier story that was about a meeting at trump tower in december where kushner, the soninlaw of the president , also met with kizliak, and kizliak also reported that conversation and the contents of that proved to be accurate. To those that read a conspiracy, that perhaps President Trump is behind this leak because based on what he said, his anger about Jeff Sessions in that article in the New York Times, you have had this information about the intercepts for sometime . Yeah, no, and, frankly, it has been rather obvious to people who were looking at it when members of congress, democrats particularly, started making public calls saying they believed there was a third meeting and asking for an investigation of the third meeting. Comey testified in early june in which he basically said, you know, there is he had reason to believe that sessions would have had to recuse himself, but he wasnt going to be able to discuss at that session in open session what that information was. So, you know, the bread crumbs, if you will, were being left in those june appearances, and so thats when we started to piece this together. Maria, you know, a lot of people could listen to this and say, look, what is the big deal if Jeff Sessions meets with the russia ambassador and talks about the Trump Campaign . He was on the campaign, one of the top surrogates. It would seem normal. What else is he going to talk about when at the republican convention, thats all you talk about, the campaign. Theres that question. The other question is why then did sessions not say, yeah, i did, i talked to him about the campaign, but sort of have to go twice to amend his testimony and now maybe a third time. And thats exactly the point, anderson. If, in fact, it was no big deal, why did he perjury himself then trying to cover it up . If this is true, thats exactly what happened. So put aside how damaging and damming this is for Jeff Sessions and the Trump Administration, this is a big deal and Jeff Sessions could be in big trouble legally because if it is true, you know i thought the first time around he p perjured himself because he lied. But this is true if these meetings happened he willfully perjured himself before congress. I have a hard time believing a man like Jeff Sessions would willfully perjure himself in the way you are discussing. We sat here for months listening to people say, the russians are bad, you cant trust the russians, theyre all liars. Tonight we hear, we have to take the russians words as the gospel when it is pointed out sometimes they lie and embellish. All we know is kizliak word versus the Justice Departments statement is, which they deny any wrong doing in this conversation. He raised that point. The other critical point you raised, anderson, is there a big deal here . Wouldnt we expect sort of, you know, conversations like this to be going on . Jeff sessions says nothing bad happened in these conversations. Why did he lie about them then . He did in that march when he recused himself he said clearly, never met with any russians. Sure. To discuss, you know, anything going on with the campaign. Im not denying that i wish they had gotten all of the meetings right on the front end, but that doesnt mean somebody willfully lied about it, which is your word. But it means he could have. And it doesnt mean he discussed anything that was any big deal. Pretty damming. Margaret . The content of the conversation is what is relevant and we dont know the content of the conversation. If the content of the conversation was talking about the campaign and possible coordination with the russian government about the campaign, that would be an incredibly big deal. We dont know what it was. The problem is that Jeff Sessions has lost an enormous amount of credibility for mpeope who want to defend him. I want to think this longserving senator had the integrity to tell the truth when being questioned in front of the american people. I have a hard time defending him because too many times he has forgotten. We have to take a quick break. Other breaking news, donald trump jr. And Paul Manafort will speak to the Senate Committee. We will tell you details of that ahead. Yeah. Everybody two seconds dear sebastian, after careful consideration of your application, it is with great pleasure that we offer our congratulations on your acceptance. Through the Tuition Assistance program, every day mcdonalds helps more people go to college. Its part of our commitment to being americas best first job. When you think of saving money, what comes to mind . Your next getaway . Connecting with family and friends . A big night out . Or maybe your everyday shopping. 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Talking about the latest bombshell report from the Washington Post. Adam from the Washington Post is with us to discuss. I want to read the department of justice statement to all of you. It says, obviously i cannot comment on the reliability of what Anonymous Sources describe in wholly uncorroborated intelligence intercept that the Washington Post has not seen and has not been provided to me, but the attorney general stands by his testimony from just last month before the Senate Intelligence committee when he specifically addressed this and said that he never met with or had any conversations with any russians or any foreign officials concerning any type of interference with any campaign or election. Interesting. I mean, adam, you tell me your reading of that statement, but theyre not standing by his statement from march saying he had no contacts with any russians during the campaign about the campaign. Now it is the focus on his june statement which was amended about interference. Right. So, yeah, no, i mean clearly they have decided theyre not saying it is not true. Just saying your sources are uncorroborated. Theyre not responding to the story. Right. What theyre basically do issiis saying theres no communication was the russians about coordination or about what russia was doing in the election. Frankly, we have nobody telling us that that was in any way discussed in any of those meetings. What we are reporting is basically that they did discuss Campaign Matters contrary to what sessions said in his march 2nd press conference. Right. And that goes to the credibility of Jeff Sessions. Carl . You know, theres a move here for the former attorney general or the current attorney general of the United States, and that is to look at the president of the United States who has thrown him under the bus and go to congress and say, im here to tell you everything you want to know about what happened in our campaign with the russians. Ask me anything you want, im going to tell you everything, im going to tell you what the president and i talked about, im going to tell you what flynn and i talked about, im going to tell you what the Russian Ambassador and i talked about, and then we will have some clarity. Why would we trust lets see what he says. I dont know if we will trust him, but lets listen to him and see if this coverup continues, because he is in a position to tell us a lot, and perhaps now that the president has thrown him under the bus he might have motivation to let us know what he knows. Is that a radical idea . It is, and it would make sense, but we know that this is an administration that doesnt listen to common sense. This could have been so much better handled from the getgo. We have all talked about this, right . Just to be straight, to be honest, to be transparent, which is what they always talk, about what actually happened. Unless the fact exactly. The fact they havent been able to do that each and every time and the fact that we continue to find out nuggets about the russian either interference or collusion or conversations about campaign remember, filled out a form straight three times, a number of these people. Exactly. And a lot of people seem to have that symptom, right . There seems to be some kind of syndrome when it comes to the russians of forgetfulness. Also be transparent what we are seeing here. Everyone has see friday night lights. Here we have another episode of friday night leaks. Another day, another friday where the president and his team have another excellent friday and here we go with another leaked report to set it up for the weekend and the sunday shows. So here is what but hes been theyve had this information. Theyve been working to try to get this information for a long time. Again, a report no one at this table has actually seen the transcript of what is actually in this, and were relying on what supposedly this Russian Ambassador said in his communication that he knows would have been monitored going back home. Look, no ambassador or spy or kislyak is in the history of mankind is going to file a report saying, m another completely worthless week here, i learned nothing. Of course theyre going to go i will say jay sekulow, the president s attorney