The Minnesota Democrat said the deal Trump and Manafort struck was “not good enough.”
Donald Trump Jr. and former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort should testify in public and under oath about potential Russia ties — not behind closed doors, Sen. Al Franken said Sunday.
The Minnesota Democrat voiced his frustration that Trump and Manafort cut a deal to get out of anticipated public testimonies before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Both men will soon sit down with the committee to discuss the notorious Trump Tower meeting last June with a Russian lawyer who promised dirt on Hillary Clinton.
But they will do so in private, and not under oath.
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“That’s not good enough, ” Franken, who is a member of the judiciary committee, told CNN’s “State of the Union.”
“And I did not know it would be not under oath. It should be under oath.”
Franken admitted he was disappointed that the committee’s chairman, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) , let Trump and Manafort get away with private and informal interviews.
The committee last week asked both men to testify as part of its investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election. It is one of several probes touching on the Trump campaign’s potential Russia ties.
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But Trump and Manafort struck a compromise. They agreed to be interviewed and to turn over documents — as long as they got to do so privately.
That contradicts Trump’s promise just two weeks ago that he would have no problem testifying under oath. In an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity, Trump’s eldest son agreed with the assertion that he had “nothing to hide.”
No date has been set for Trump and Manafort’s secret Senate sitdowns. There is no indication that transcripts of the testimonies will be released.
Trump and Manafort both participated in the meeting last year with Russian nationals after being promised incriminating information about Clinton. Trump never revealed the meeting until The New York Times reported on it this month, and he claimed no “meaningful” information emerged from it.
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Franken said he wanted to ask both men if they “had other meetings with Russians.”
He also said he “absolutely” wants another testimony from U. S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, after a Washington Post report said Sessions had held yet another undisclosed meeting with a Russian ambassador during the campaign last year. Sessions denied any such meetings when he testified before the intelligence committee in June.
President Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner joined Trump Jr. and Manafort at the Trump Tower meeting last year, and he is set to testify twice this week.
Kushner will speak to the Senate Intelligence Committee on Monday and with the House Intelligence Committee on Tuesday. Both meetings will be private.
