Vice President Mike Pence defended Attorney General Jeff Sessions after Sessions announced Thursday that he would recuse himself from matters relating to the Trump campaign at the Department of Justice.
The Washington Post reported Wednesday that Sessions had met twice with the Russian ambassador to the United States during the presidential campaign, despite telling the Senate Judiciary Committee during his confirmation hearings, in part: “I did not have communications with the Russians.”
“No, I was not aware of Jeff Sessions’ meeting, nor would I have expected to have been,” Pence told reporters Friday. “The President and I have full confidence in the attorney general. He is a man of integrity. As the President said, he could have answered the question more clearly, but it was clearly unintentional. I think he’s corrected the record appropriately. And we’re just very confident in his ability to lead this agency and respect his decision to recuse himself.”
President Donald Trump on Thursday dismissed reports of Sessions’ meetings with Kislyak.
In a statement, he called the story, and the leaks that led to it and many others, “a total witch hunt.” He did not dispute that Sessions met with the ambassador.
“This whole narrative is a way of saving face for Democrats losing an election that everyone thought they were supposed to win. The Democrats are overplaying their hand. They lost the election and now, they have lost their grip on reality,” he said. “The real story is all of the illegal leaks of classified and other information. It is a total witch hunt!”
