President Trump said Wednesday that he only recently about a meeting his son, Donald Trump Jr., held with a Russian lawyer peddling damaging information about Hillary Clinton during the presidential race.

"That I didn't know until a couple of days ago when I heard about this," Trump told Reuters in an interview on Wednesday, just hours before he left for his third trip abroad.

Trump defended his son's decision to take the meeting, which was set up in June 2016 by an entertainment publicist who acted as an intermediary for the Russian attorney, despite Trump Jr.'s belief that the lawyer had connections to the Kremlin.

"I think many people would have held that meeting," Trump told Reuters.

Trump Jr. has argued anyone in his position would have welcomed opposition research on a political opponent and noted that the meeting ultimately focused on policy issues unrelated to the campaign.

But critics have pointed to the revelation as the clearest evidence yet that high-level Trump associates had inappropriate contacts with Russian officials and possibly colluded with them in an effort to tip the election to Trump.