Whatever the legality, the emails released by Donald Trump Jr. on Tuesday show the circuitous route the Russian government used to attempt to influence the presidential campaign of his father.

Trump Jr. released the emails that were the subject of a New York Times article, showing how the president’s son was well aware of links to the Russian government before he decided to meet with a lawyer reportedly linked to the Kremlin.

Read:Donald Trump Jr. releases emails saying Russian government had incriminating Clinton information

Rob Goldstone is a publicist for Emin Agalarov, a pop star and the son of Aras Agalarov, President Trump’s business partner in bringing the Miss Universe pageant to Moscow. The elder Agalarov is also a property developer who worked on a now-stalled project to build a Trump Tower in Moscow.

Goldstone, according to the emails, told Trump Jr.: “The crown prosecutor of Russia met with his father Aras this morning and in their meeting offered to provide the Trump campaign with some official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father.”

Trump Jr’s response: “If it’s what you say, I love it.”

Trump Jr. did eventually meet with Natalia Veselnitskaya — alongside Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and now a senior adviser at the White House, and Paul Manafort, then the campaign chairman. He now describes being “agitated” by a meeting he perceived to be fruitless.

“The woman, as she has said publicly, was not a government official. And, as we have said, she had no information to provide and wanted to talk about adoption policy and the Magnitsky Act.”

The emails will be pored over by the Russian interference investigation conducted by special counsel Robert Mueller, as well as House and Senate Intelligence Committee probes into the matter.

Kushner had to amend a disclosure form to reflect this meeting, according to the New York Times article.