Day 738: NYT: Over 100 contacts by at least 17 Trump team members with Russia pre-inauguration

The denials about the Donald Trump-Russia connection have been fierce from the right and Trump himself for years. Yet many of Trump’s aides — many of them at the top of the campaign hierarchy — lied to the FBI or Congress about such connections for reasons that Robert Mueller is sure to flesh out in full detail in the coming months.

The New York Times has painstakingly detailed all of the Trump-Russia contacts currently known about from the time Trump announced his campaign to immediately following his inauguration.

During the 2016 presidential campaign and transition, Donald J. Trump and at least 17 campaign officials and advisers had contacts with Russian nationals and WikiLeaks, or their intermediaries, a New York Times analysis has found. At least 10 other associates were told about interactions but did not have any themselves.

Knowledge of these interactions is based on New York Times reporting, documents submitted to Congress, and court records and accusations related to the special counsel investigating foreign interference in the election.

Among these contacts are more than 100 in-person meetings, phone calls, text messages, emails and private messages on Twitter. Mr. Trump and his campaign repeatedly denied having such contacts with Russians during the 2016 election.

The contacts by at least 17 people include the convicted — like Paul Manafort, Michael Cohen, Michael Flynn, Rick Gates and George Papadopoulos — to the indicted — like Roger Stone — to the (presumably) still being investigated family members, other top aides and Trump himself.

The Times found that Trump had at least six contacts with Russian officials or their agents and his son, Donald Jr., had at least 17 such contacts, including the infamous June 2016 meeting in Trump Tower. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, had at least six contacts, including the sketchy attempt to set up secret, back-channel communications with the Russians.

The “no collusion” argument hit another major speed bump with Stone’s indictment on Friday. As the Times lays out, based on the sheer number of contacts, there could be plenty more on the way.

738 days in, 724 to go

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