The Latest: 3 top Trump insiders to talk to Senate panels

The session with Kushner will apparently take place behind closed doors.

Donald Trump Jr. is scheduled to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee next Wednesday along with former campaign chairman Paul Manafort.

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6:10 p.m.

Members of the Trump campaign’s inner circle are being scheduled to talk to Senate committees next week.

President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, will speak with the Senate intelligence committee on Monday. That’s according to his lawyer, Abbe Lowell. He says Kushner is voluntarily co-operating with congressional probes. That interview will likely take place behind closed doors.

Donald Trump Jr. and former campaign manager Paul Manafort are scheduled to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee next Wednesday. They are among witnesses the panel has announced for a hearing on foreign influence in elections.

All three men are almost certain to be asked about recent revelations they attended a June 2016 meeting with a Russian lawyer and others in the expectation of receiving incriminating information about Hillary Clinton.

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1 p.m.

The House Intelligence Committee’s top Democrat says the panel is reaching out to participants in a 2016 meeting between top Trump officials and people linked to Russia.

California Rep. Adam Schiff says the committee is asking them for “testimony and documents.”

He says he wants to hear from everyone in the meeting, including Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya. Veselnitskaya told a Kremlin-funded RT television outlet Wednesday that she is ready to testify before the Senate. Both the House and Senate intelligence panels are investigating Russian meddling in the U.S. election.

President Donald Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr., his son-in-law Jared Kushner and former campaign chairman Paul Manafort all attended the meeting.

12:50 p.m.

The Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee says he wants President Donald Trump’s son and his former campaign chairman to testify before senators leave for August recess.

Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley said Wednesday that he’s been talking to Donald Trump Jr.’s lawyer and “I didn’t get any pushback” when he suggested he testify this week. But he said “it’s kind of rushy” to call him in so quickly and Democrats wanted to review documents they’d requested first.

The hearing will review a law that oversees the registration of foreign agents. Trump Jr. and former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort attended a campaign meeting last year with a Russian-American lobbyist who has been under investigation by the panel.

The Judiciary panel is also investigating Russian meddling in the 2016 election.

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12:15 p.m.

Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr says he is not going to the White House while his panel is investigating Russian election meddling and ties to the Trump campaign.

Other Republican senators were heading to the White House for lunch Wednesday at the invitation of President Trump. But Burr was spotted buying lunch in the small cafeteria in the basement of the Capitol.

The North Carolina lawmaker told a small group of reporters that he was steering clear of the White House altogether while his investigation is underway. He said he does not want to risk being seen shaking hands with someone. Burr did not say who he was referring to.

11:45 a.m.

The top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee says President Donald Trump’s eldest son should testify publicly.

Virginia Sen. Mark Warner says “it’s still being worked out” if some of the committee’s more high-profile witnesses, including Donald Trump Jr. and former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, should testify publicly or privately. The committee is investigating Russian meddling in the 2016 election and possible links to the Trump campaign.

Warner says that for Trump Jr., “he’s got no security clearances that I am aware of, so he should be able to testify in public.”

Trump Jr. and Manafort could testify in the Senate Judiciary Committee. The top Democrat on that panel, Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California, said this week that special counsel Robert Mueller has cleared them for public testimony.

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8:40 a.m.

The Russian lawyer who met with President Donald Trump’s eldest son during the 2016 election campaign says she’s ready to testify before the U.S. Senate.

Natalia Veselnitskaya says in an interview with Kremlin-funded RT television broadcast Wednesday that she’s “ready to clarify the situation behind the mass hysteria, but only through lawyers or testifying in the Senate.”

Donald Trump Jr. agreed to meet with Veselnitskaya in June 2016 after being told that she could provide incriminating information about Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. The meeting had been billed as part of a Russian government effort to help the Republican’s White House campaign.

Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and then-campaign chairman Paul Manafort also took part in the meeting at Trump Tower.

The Associated Press

by Canadian Press

The Latest: 3 top Trump insiders to talk to Senate panels

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