During a television interview Tuesday, Omarosa Manigault-Newman made a bombshell claim about a matter central to the Trump-Russia investigation — but offered no specifics or corroboration to back it up.

MSNBC’s Katy Tur asked the former White House and Trump campaign staffer whether Donald Trump knew about hacked Democratic emails before they were publicly released during the 2016 — and Omarosa responded, “Absolutely.”

Tur followed up: “He knew what was coming out before WikiLeaks released them?” And Omarosa said, “Yes.” She also claimed that she had been interviewed by special counsel Robert Mueller’s team but offered no further specifics.

These are extremely vague claims, and it’s difficult to know what to make of them without more details — details that Manigault-Newman does not provide in her new book.

This is an important question

The question of whether Trump’s associates coordinated with Russia or WikiLeaks over the release of hacked Democratic emails in 2016 looms large over the Mueller investigation. If such a thing happened, it could mean they worked with foreign nationals to use stolen material to interfere with the campaign.

There have been some indications that Trump’s team had at least some inkling of what was coming. For instance, campaign aide George Papadopoulos admitted that he was told the Russians had “thousands of emails” related to Hillary Clinton. Donald Trump Jr. eagerly agreed to take a meeting with a Russian delegation in hopes of getting incriminating information on Clinton (though this information was not said to be emails specifically).

But it’s never been proven that any further or more detailed coordination or conspiracy came about. Specifically, it’s never been definitively shown that the Trump team was in the loop on or involved in the two biggest email dumps to WikiLeaks, of the DNC’s emails and John Podesta’s emails.

Omarosa’s statements are very vague

JUST IN: Omarosa asserts to @KatyTurNBC that President Trump knew about the forthcoming leak of Clinton emails before they were leaked. pic.twitter.com/xHQlWnB73H — MSNBC (@MSNBC) August 14, 2018

So that brings us to to the interview with MSNBC’s Katy Tur. Here’s how the exchange begins:

TUR: You were instructed, according to your book, to bring up the emails at every point you could at the end of the 2016 campaign. MANIGAULT-NEWMAN: Yes, that’s correct. TUR: Hillary Clinton’s emails. MANIGAULT-NEWMAN: Yes, that was our talker.

Now, a clarifying point here — the emails that leaked at the end of the 2016 campaign were actually Clinton campaign chair John Podesta’s, though Clinton herself had written some emails to him.

Tur then asks the key question:

TUR: Did Donald Trump know about those emails before they came out? MANIGAULT-NEWMAN: Absolutely. TUR: He knew about them. MANIGAULT-NEWMAN: Yes. TUR: He knew what was coming out before WikiLeaks released them. MANIGAULT-NEWMAN: Yes.

Manigault-Newman then refuses to give any more specifics. So really all we have from her is “Absolutely,” “yes,” and “yes” to questions framed by Tur. She doesn’t explain how she is so sure Trump knew about them, either.

What does this mean? Who knows.

So there’s a range of possibilities as to what’s going on here. One is, of course, that Omarosa is just lying. After all, if true, this would seem to be interesting information worthy of inclusion in her book — but it’s not in there.

But even if what she is saying has some truth to it, its ultimate implications will depend a whole lot on the specifics of what Trump allegedly “knew” before the Podesta emails came out in October 2016.

For instance: It was no secret that Julian Assange of WikiLeaks was claiming to have more damaging information that he’d release before the end of the campaign; Assange was happily saying so publicly, as early as August 2016.

What was secret — and a surprise — is that those emails were Podesta’s. That information remained under wraps until WikiLeaks began posting the emails on October 7, 2016.

So what is Manigault-Newman claiming that Trump knew? Merely what Assange said publicly, which would be a nothingburger? Or that he had an inside secret line on Assange’s plans, or what specifically Assange had, which would be far more consequential and damning? As of now, it’s difficult to understand what her claim even is.

Did Omarosa talk to Mueller’s team?

Another question raised by Manigault-Newman’s recent interviews is whether she has in fact given important information to special counsel Robert Mueller’s team.

In her book, Manigault-Newman writes of the Mueller investigation, and says that “in early 2018,” she “received a call from the FBI.” She adds, “We’ll see how that goes,” without explaining anything more.

Then on MSNBC’s Hardball Monday, in response to a question about Mueller, she said, “If his office calls again, anything they want, I’ll share” — suggesting, again, that her contact had been in the form of a call.

Now, on Tuesday, Tur followed up and asked Manigault-Newman, “Have you been interviewed by the special counsel?” She answered, “I have.” But once again, she refused to answer further questions on the topic.

These references to a “call” rather than an in-person meeting or grand jury appearance don’t really make her sound particularly central to the investigation. So we will have to stay tuned to see if Manigault-Newman backs up her claims with more specifics, or becomes more involved in Mueller’s probe — or if these vague claims will remain uncorroborated.