Senators ask FBI to review AG Jeff Sessions' ties to Russia, raise prospect of perjury

Kevin Johnson | USA TODAY

Show Caption Hide Caption Jeff Sessions might have met with Russian official a third time CNN reports investigators are focused on a possible meeting that might have taken place April 27, 2016. Video provided by Newsy

WASHINGTON — Raising the prospect of perjury, two Senate Democrats privately pressed the FBI to determine whether Attorney General Jeff Sessions failed to disclose a third meeting with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak during a April 2016 campaign event for then-presidential candidate Donald Trump at Washington’s Mayflower Hotel.

On Thursday, Sens. Patrick Leahy of Vermont and Al Franken of Minnesota released three written requests they made earlier this year for an FBI review of Sessions after he belatedly disclosed two other meetings with Kislyak following his January confirmation hearing, in which the then-attorney general nominee said he was unaware of any such contacts.

In an April letter to James Comey, who was FBI Director at the time, the senators asked for a May 12 briefing on their request, but that meeting was scuttled by Trump's abrupt dismissal of Comey on May 9.

"Since then, we have been in communication with the FBI concerning a response... and we expect to be briefed on this matter in the near future,'' Leahy and Franken said in a joint statement.

"We served with the attorney general in the Senate and on the Judiciary Committee for many years. We know he would not tolerate dishonesty if he were in our shoes. If it is determined that the attorney general still has not been truthful with Congress and the American people about his contacts with Russian officials during the campaign, he needs to resign.''

Sessions amended his January testimony following disclosures in The Washington Post that he had met with the ambassador in July at the Republican National Convention and in September in the Washington office of the then-Alabama senator.

"We are concerned by Attorney General Sessions' lack of candor to the committee and his failure thus far to accept responsibility for testimony that could be construed as perjury,'' the senators wrote in their initial March 20 letter to Comey. That was the same day the former FBI director publicly acknowledged the existence of the bureau's months-long inquiry into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian officials.

Facing a storm of criticism about his failure to disclose the two encounters, Sessions recused himself in March from any involvement in the FBI’s inquiry into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election.

Oversight of the inquiry, which also includes whether Trump campaign associates colluded with Russian officials, was passed to Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who earlier this month appointed special counsel Robert Mueller to manage the widening Russia investigation.

Late Wednesday, CNN reported that congressional investigators conducting parallel probes into Russian interference also were reviewing a possible undisclosed April meeting between Sessions and Kislyak at the Mayflower.

But Justice officials have strongly denied any such contact between Sessions and Kislyak.

“The facts haven't changed,’’ Justice spokeswoman Sarah Isgur Flores said. “The then-senator did not have any private or side conversations with any Russian officials at the Mayflower Hotel.’’

After the March 20 and April 28 letters to Comey yielded no response, the lawmakers followed up with a May 12 notice to acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe.

"We expected Director Comey to brief us on the status of this investigation by today,'' Leahy and Franken told McCabe. "In light of President Trump's abrupt dismissal of Director Comey, we write to alert you to our previous correspondence with him and to arrange for a briefing.''