Sen. Lindsey Graham told CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday morning that he did not trust the Washington Post‘s Friday evening story claiming that Jared Kushner wanted to set up a back channel to the Russian government.
“I don’t trust this story as far as I can throw it,” Graham said.
Asked about the “bombshell” report, and the claims by former CIA agent and former presidential candidate Evan McMullin that Kushner’s activities amount to “treason,” Graham was dismissive.
“We’re chasing our tails, as a nation, when it comes to the Russians. I don’t know who leaked this supposed conversation. But just think about it this way. You’ve got the ambassador to Russia reporting back, on an open channel, ‘Hey, Jared Kushner’s gonna move into the embassy.’ …
“I think it makes no sense that the Russian ambassador would report back to Moscow on a channel that he most likely knows we’re monitoring. The whole story line is suspicious. I’ve never been more concerned and suspicious about all thing Russia than I am right now. So I’m not going to jump to the conclusion that Mr. McMullin jumped to.”
(On the subject of treason, McMullin has previously said that intelligence officials should leak information to the media because he considers President Trump a threat to the nation.)
Asked whether he thought Kislyak had intended his conversation to be intercepted, Graham said it was a possibility, given that FBI director James Comey had intervened in the 2016 election based on an email from a Democratic operative that was intercepted by Russia, and which was later said to be fake. “If that was fake, why don’t you think this was fake?”
Graham said he did not know whether the email, which hinted that former Attorney Loretta Lynch would quash any investigation into Hillary Clinton, was fake, but he distrusted any Russian source regardless.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News. He was named one of the “most influential” people in news media in 2016. He is the co-author of How Trump Won: The Inside Story of a Revolution, is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.