Donald Trump Jr, the eldest son of US President Donald Trump, today released a chain of emails showing a Russian source offering the Trump campaign "sensitive information" about White House rival Hillary Clinton in the run-up to the 2016 presidential election.
In an email to 39-year-old Trump Jr, who is in the middle of a political storm over his meetings with a Russian source, Rob Goldstone said the information "would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father".
Goldstone acted as an intermediary to set up the meeting with the Russian source.
"This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government's support for Mr Trump," he said.
In another email, Goldstone wrote that the information can be shared with then Republican presidential candidate Trump through one of his longtime aide Rhona Graff.
In a statement, Trump Jr said he had the meeting with Goldstone on June 9, 2016. The first email came on June 3, 2016. Trump Jr has denied any wrongdoings.
In the confidential email, Goldstone says Emin Agalarov "just called and asked me to contact you with something very interesting".
Agalarov is a singer-songwriter. Her father is a Moscow- based developer who tried to partner with Donald Trump on a hotel project.
"The Crown prosecutor of Russia met with his father Aras this morning and in their meeting offered to provide the Trump campaign with some official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father," Goldstone wrote.
"This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government's support for Mr Trump - helped along by Aras and Emin," he wrote.
The email started the process for the meeting between the two.
"The information they suggested they had about Hillary Clinton I thought was Political Opposition Research. I first wanted to just have a phone call but when that didn't work out, they said the woman would be in New York and asked if I would meet," Trump Jr said in a statement.
In his statement today, Trump Jr said the woman "was not a government official. And, as we have said, she had no information to provide and wanted to talk about adoption policy and the Magnitsky Act".
"To put this in context, this occurred before the current Russian fever was in vogue," the son said.
The New York Times, which first broke the story, said the email exchanges offer a detailed unspooling of how the meeting with Kremlin-connected Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya came about - and just how eager Donald Trump Jr was to accept what he was explicitly told was the Russian government's help.
"The Justice Department, as well as the House and Senate Intelligence Committees, is examining whether any of President Trump's associates colluded with the Russian government to disrupt last year's election," the daily added.
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