Jeff Sessions to face crucial test on Russia at House hearing Tuesday

Show Caption Hide Caption Trump says he believes Putin when he says he didn't meddle in election President Donald Trump says he asked Vladimir Putin about Russian interference in the 2016 president election while in Vietnam. Video provided by Newsy

WASHINGTON — Attorney General Jeff Sessions could not have been more definitive when he told a Senate panel last month that he had no knowledge of Trump campaign contacts with Russia.

“I did not, and I’m not aware of anyone else that did,” Sessions told the Senate Judiciary Committee. “I don’t believe that happened.”

Democrats and Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee are preparing a strong challenge to Sessions’ assertions at a hearing Tuesday, based largely on the guilty plea of George Papadopoulos, who served as a foreign policy adviser to the Trump campaign and admitted to the FBI he attended a national security meeting in March 2016 with then-candidate Donald Trump, Sessions and other advisers.

At that meeting, which Sessions chaired, Papadopoulos told the group he had connections that could help arrange a meeting between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to the the charging documents unsealed last month by special counsel Robert Mueller.

The March 2016 gathering of the Trump campaign’s national security team promises to be a central focus of Tuesday’s hearing as the attorney general will be asked to reconcile his past assertions for the first time since the damaging Papadopoulos disclosures.

More: Timeline: The many times George Papadopoulos tried to connect the Trump campaign with Russia

For Sessions, the House hearing represents yet another crucial test for an attorney general seeking to bolster his standing with three separate and important constituencies: Congress, President Trump, and special counsel Robert Mueller.

Dogged by his own failure to disclose prior contacts with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak during his Senate confirmation, Sessions has sought to shore up his credibility with Congress. With Papadopoulos’ account now public, Mueller’s team will no doubt be paying close attention to Sessions’ House appearance where he will be testifying under oath.

And then there is the audience of one — Trump — whose mercurial relationship with the attorney general makes Sessions the most tenuous of any Cabinet member in the current administration.

"The president grades his Cabinet members on public appearances, and I think you can expect Attorney General Sessions' performance to be intensely scrutinized by the president and others at the White House," said Mark Corallo, a former spokesman for Trump's Russia legal team. "The bigger problem for the attorney general is that he is not likely to get the backup from Republican members that he would like because of the attention that he has drawn to himself."

Corallo, a strong supporter of the attorney general, referred to Sessions' closely examined testimony at his January confirmation hearing where he did not acknowledge at least two prior contacts with the Russian ambassador when pressed by Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn.

When the contacts were ultimately disclosed, the political firestorm that followed prompted Sessions to recuse himself from the Russia investigation and the Justice Department to appoint Mueller to lead the inquiry — a move that still rankles Trump and ruptured his relationship with Sessions, one of the president's earliest and most loyal supporters.

"Unfortunately, the attorney general is still paying a price for that," Corallo said. "I think he will acquit himself well, but Republicans don't always tend to be supportive of their own."

Jack Sharman, who served as a special counsel to the House Banking Committee during independent counsel Kenneth Starr's investigation of President Clinton, said some Republicans are likely assessing the political damage inflicted by Sessions' past testimony and contemplating the risks of throwing their support to him.

"It might get to the point where it becomes more difficult for your allies on the committee to help you," Sharman said.

Committee Democrats and some conservative Republicans already have put Sessions on notice to prepare himself for an unusually adversarial encounter — even by raucous House standards.

"The facts appear to contradict your sworn testimony," Michigan Rep. John Conyers, the panel's senior Democrat, said in a Nov. 7 letter to the attorney general, referring to Sessions' Senate testimony last month and at his earlier confirmation hearing.

"When you appear before our committee we intend to ask you about these inconsistencies," Conyers and the other Democrats wrote. "We are providing you with notice in advance because we expect you to respond. We will urge our chairman to resort to compulsory process if you do not."

On the other side of the political spectrum, conservative Republican Reps. Jim Jordan of Ohio and Matt Gaetz of Florida said in an op-ed on foxnews.com Monday that Sessions should appoint a second special counsel to investigate actions taken by former FBI director James Comey and former attorney general Loretta Lynch related to the closure of the email investigation that dogged Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton.

"It’s time for Jeff Sessions to name a Special Counsel and get answers for the American people," the two congressmen wrote. "If not, he should step down."

The House committee is viewed as one of the most partisan panels in Congress, with many of its members — 24 Republicans and 17 Democrats — representing ideological extremes on both the left and right. The Senate Judiciary Committee has just 20 members who largely showed deference to their former colleague. Sessions served for 20 years as a U.S. senator from Alabama.

In addition to the Russia investigation, Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., said Sessions should expect "spirited questioning" on recent spikes in violent crime, firearms policy in the wake of two mass shootings, immigration enforcement and the Justice Department's recent move to support harsher sentencing policy.

But Sessions likely will be hard-pressed to move beyond the cloud of the Russia investigation and his association with it.

Last week, transcripts released by the House Intelligence Committee — one of three congressional panels investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election — revealed that former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page notified then-Sen. Sessions of his intent to give a July speech in Moscow where Page met Russia's deputy prime minister.

Sharman said the recent Papadopoulos and Page disclosures make Sessions at least a "witness" in the Mueller inquiry as it churns on. (Sessions told the Senate committee last month that the special counsel had not yet sought to interview him.)

"What this (hearing) might do for his job security prospects, I don't know," Sharman said. "But the attorney general serves at the pleasure of the president."

And Trump has taken no pleasure in Sessions or the Justice Department. Earlier this month, the president said he was "disappointed" in the department for not pursuing Clinton and Democrats further.

"I'm really not involved with the Justice Department," Trump said before leaving on his Asia trip. "I'd like to let it run itself, but honestly they should be looking at the Democrats. They should be looking at a lot of things. And a lot of people are disappointed in the Justice Department, including me."

Few may grasp the predicament Sessions faces more than former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

With a political storm threatening his own short tenure, Gonzales struggled during multiple congressional hearings to explain the firing of nine U.S. attorneys. The controversy and the shadow it cast over the Justice Department ultimately triggered his resignation to then-President George W. Bush.

“It’s a tough place to be,” Gonzales said of his congressional appearances before the Senate and House Judiciary committees.

Gonzales said that congressional testimony, if not delivered with precision, can be misinterpreted and used against a witness.

“If there are discrepancies or inconsistencies, some may think you are trying to hide something when in fact you were just confused,” Gonzales said, adding that he sometimes was still thinking of a previous question while answering a new one.

Ironically, one of the lawmakers who pressed hardest was Sessions, who was then a member of the Judiciary Committee.

“He was only doing his job," Gonzales said. "I have nothing but respect for Attorney General Sessions. I wish him the best."

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