Even though President Donald Trump gave Jeff Sessions a lot of flack during his tenure as attorney general for recusing himself from the FBI special counsel’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election cycle, the Robert Mueller report’s release on Thursday shows why Sessions had an incontrovertible conflict of interest: He was personally under investigation by the special counsel’s office.
Pages 197-198 of the report detailed that the special counsel’s office investigated Sessions’ interactions with Russian Ambassador Kislyak in April, July and September 2016 when Sessions was still Alabama’s junior senator. Not only did they look into the interactions themselves, which Sessions has maintained did not relate to the Trump campaign, but the special counsel’s office examined whether Sessions committed perjury or made false statements to Congress in regards to these interactions.
Ultimately, they found Sessions’ explanation of his statements to be “plausible,” so there was “insufficient” evidence “to prove that Sessions was willingly untruthful in his answers.” Therefore, consistent with DOJ policy, the special counsel declined to prosecute Sessions and informed his attorney of that decision in March of 2018.
Read the relevant portion of the report for yourself:
Sean Ross is a staff writer for Yellowhammer News. You can follow him on Twitter @sean_yhn
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