[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 7]
[Senate]
[Page 10257]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                          RUSSIA INVESTIGATION

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, finally, a word on the revelation that 
President Trump's son, his son-in-law, and his campaign manager met 
with a lawyer with ties to the Kremlin with the pretext of discussing 
information that would be damaging to Secretary Clinton's campaign.
  This revelation should be the end of the idea pushed by the 
administration and the President that there is absolutely no evidence 
of an intent by the Trump campaign to coordinate or collude. It is 
certainly not proof positive--we don't know what was said in the 
meeting--but these reports in the press at least demand further 
investigation.
  It defies credulity that the President's campaign manager, his son, 
and his son-in-law, at the height of a very, very heated campaign--
three people very close to the President and at the helm of that 
campaign--were all going to a meeting with a Russian lawyer to discuss 
Russian adoption. Indeed, Donald Trump, Jr., has now admitted--after he 
first said the purpose of the meeting was adoption--that he agreed to 
meet to get potentially damaging information about Hillary Clinton.
  The Senate Intelligence Committee has already indicated that it will 
look into the possibility of coordination or collusion as part of their 
broader investigation. This meeting and the background behind it should 
be included in future document requests and additional lines of 
inquiry.
  After providing documents to the Intelligence Committee, Donald 
Trump, Jr., must also testify before the committee to explain why three 
of the highest level members of the Trump administration thought it was 
appropriate to meet with a Russian source to receive information about 
a political opponent. We are talking about the wellspring and pride of 
our democracy--free and fair elections without foreign interference.
  When the President of the United States is unwilling to forcibly 
defend our democracy, a violation of our sovereignty, face to face with 
its chief adversary, when we continue to learn of additional meetings 
between his campaign and Russian sources, when we hear that the White 
House is actively working to water down or stall a bill of tough Russia 
sanctions, we in Congress need to step up and defend the vital 
interests of our country. Both parties should be united in that effort 
because, at least for now, the President seems unwilling to do so.

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