WASHINGTON — A Russian-American lobbyist says he attended a June 2016 meeting with President Donald Trump's son, marking another shift in the account of a discussion that was billed as part of a Russian government effort to help the Republican's White House campaign.
Rinat Akhmetshin confirmed his participation to The Associated Press on Friday. Akhmetshin has been reported to have ties to Russian intelligence agencies, though he denies ever working as an intelligence agent. He told the AP that he served in the Soviet military in a unit that was part of counterintelligence but was never formally trained as a spy.
The meeting has heightened questions about whether Trump's campaign coordinated with the Russian government during the election, which is the focus of federal and congressional investigations. In emails posted by Donald Trump Jr. earlier this week, an associate who arranged the meeting said a Russian lawyer wanted to pass on negative information about Democrat Hillary Clinton and stated that the discussion was part of a Russian government effort to help the GOP candidate.
While Trump Jr. has confirmed that Russian attorney Natalia Veselnitskaya was in the meeting, he did not disclose Akhmetshin's presence. The president's son has tried to discount the meeting, saying that he did not receive the information he was promised.
Akhmetshin said Veselnitskaya presented the Trump associates with details of what she believed were illicit funds that had been funneled to the Democratic National Committee. And she suggested that making the information public could help the Trump campaign.
"This could be a good issue to expose how the DNC is accepting bad money," Akhmetshin recalled her saying.
Trump Jr. asked the attorney if she had all the evidence to back up her claims, but Veselnitskaya said the Trump campaign would need to research it more. After that Trump Jr. lost interest, according to Akhmetshin.
"They couldn't wait for the meeting to end," he said.
Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law and current White House senior adviser, and then-campaign chairman Paul Manafort also attended the meeting.
Asked about Akhmetshin's participation in the meeting, Manafort spokesman Jason Maloni declined comment. A spokesman for Kushner did not respond to inquiries, nor did Trump Jr.'s attorney.