Sarah Sanders on Trump Tower Meeting Statement

THEN

NOW

August 1, 2017

June 4, 2018

Sarah Sanders Trump Tower Meeting Statement Then

"Trump certainly didn't dictate the statement."
- Aug 1, 2017

"I'm not going to respond to his lawyers stating he did."
June 4, 2018 -

Sarah Sanders Trump Tower Meeting Statement Now

#SarahSanders 8/1/17: "The President…certainly didn’t dictate ❲the Trump Tower Meeting statement❳." » #Sanders 6/4/18: "I’m not going to respond to ❲his lawyers stating he did❳." Click To Tweet

Quotes by Sarah Sanders on Whether Trump Dictated the Trump Tower Meeting Statement

THEN

August 1, 2017

“The President weighed in as any father would, based on the limited information that he had… He certainly didn’t dictate, but he – like I said, he weighed in, offered suggestion like any father would do.”
- Aug 1, 2017

The White House, Aug. 1, 2017
Press Briefing by Press Secretary Sarah Sanders

(retrieved 8/1/18)

starts at 3:31

NOW

June 4, 2018

“I’m not going to respond to a letter from the President’s outside counsel [that said Trump dictated the statement]. We’ve purposefully walled off, and I would refer you to them for comment.”
June 4, 2018 -

The White House, June 4, 2018
Press Briefing by Press Secretary Sarah Sanders

(retrieved 8/1/18)

starts at 13:24

Context

On July 8, 2017, after being presented with findings that he, his brother-in-law Jared Kushner, and then-Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort met with Kremlin-connected Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya at Trump Tower on June 9, 2016, Donald Trump Jr. responded with this statement to the New York Times:¹

It was a short introductory meeting. I asked Jared and Paul to stop by. We primarily discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children that was active and popular with American families years ago and was since ended by the Russian government, but it was not a campaign issue at the time and there was no follow up.

I was asked to attend the meeting by an acquaintance, but was not told the name of the person I would be meeting with beforehand.²

Trump Jr.’s statement contradicted his previous assertions that he did not meet with Russians during the campaign under “set up” circumstances or “representing the campaign in any way, shape or form.”³ The statement also did not mention that Trump Jr. was promised damaging information about Hillary Clinton from a “Russian government attorney” before agreeing to the meeting, and that the Magnitsky Act was discussed in contradiction with Trump Jr.’s previous assertion that he did not discuss Russian-related US policy with Russians during the campaign. This information became public over the next few days.⁴⁵⁶

In the following week Jay Sekulow, a lawyer for Donald Trump, repeatedly denied that Trump had any involvement in drafting the Trump Tower meeting statement. Sekulow also said Trump was not aware of the July 9, 2016, Trump Tower meeting until “very recently, right before this came out.”⁷⁸⁹

On July 31, 2017, the Washington Post reported that Trump “personally dictated” the statement “according to multiple people with knowledge of the deliberations.”¹⁰ In response to questions about the report Sarah Sanders said Trump “certainly didn’t dictate” the statement and instead just “weighed in, offered suggestions like any father would do.“¹¹

On June 2, 2018, the New York Times published a memo that Trump lawyers including Sekulow submitted to special counsel Robert Mueller on January 29, 2018, wherein the lawyers stated that Trump “dictated” the statement.¹²¹³ When asked in a press conference two days later about the contradiction between what Sanders previously stated and what the White House lawyers wrote to Mueller she repeatedly refused to respond.¹⁴

That Was Then This Is Now

Contradictory Quotes by Powerful People

Sarah Sanders on Trump Tower Meeting Statement

Quotes by Sarah Sanders on Whether Trump Dictated the Trump Tower Meeting Statement

THEN

NOW

August 1, 2017

June 4, 2018

Quotes by Sarah Sanders on Whether Trump Dictated the Trump Tower Meeting Statement

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NOW

Context

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