Don’t forget Donald Trump Jr. and his Trump Tower meeting. He broke the law, too. – USA Today op-ed by Fred Wertheimer
Enclosed is an opinion piece entitled “Don’t forget Donald Trump Jr. and his Trump Tower meeting. He broke the law, too,” which was published here in USA Today on August 29, 2018. Read the full piece below or here.
Don’t forget Donald Trump Jr. and his Trump Tower meeting. He broke the law, too.
Fred Wertheimer | August 29, 2018 | USA Today
Just look at the legal definitions for ‘contribution’ and ‘solicit.’ There’s smoking-gun evidence that Donald Trump Jr. broke campaign-finance laws.
Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to two felony campaign-finance violations last week and implicated President Donald Trump in those violations. But we should not lose sight of another person in Trump’s orbit who also apparently violated campaign-finance laws in the 2016 presidential election. That would be his son.
There is “smoking gun” evidence that Donald Trump Jr. violated the statutory prohibition against a person soliciting a contribution to influence an election from a foreign national — which includes foreign countries, corporations and individuals.
Congress enacted this law for an important and straightforward reason: it did not want foreign countries, corporations and individuals to provide any resources to influence our elections. It also did not want anyone soliciting such resources.
On June 3, 2016 Trump Jr. received an email from Rob Goldstone, a music publicist, who 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.” The email also said, “This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump.”
Russia’s campaign contribution to Trump
In the context of the campaign-finance laws, “contribution” is defined as any “thing of value” provided “in connection with a Federal … election.”
Incriminating documents and information about Hillary Clinton that would be “very useful” to presidential candidate Trump would clearly be something “of value.” This was offered to Trump Jr. in connection with the 2016 presidential election and was expressly made on behalf of a foreign country. Thus, the offer made to Trump Jr. falls squarely within the definition of “contribution.”
Trump Jr. responded to Goldstone on the same day, stating, “if it’s what you say I love it especially later in the summer.” A few days later, on June 7, Goldstone emailed Trump Jr. to set up a meeting with him and “the Russian government attorney who is flying over from Moscow for this Thursday.”
On June 9, Donald Trump Jr. attended that meeting at Trump Tower. He stated that at the meeting he pressed the Russian government attorney for the information on Hillary Clinton discussed in the email exchange.
“Solicit,” in the context of the campaign-finance laws, means to “ask, request or recommend, explicitly or implicitly” that a person provide “anything of value.”
In saying about the information offered in the email that he would “love it,” and in attending the Trump Tower meeting and in pressing the Russian government attorney for the information about Hillary Clinton, Trump Jr. solicited a “thing of value” in connection with a federal election from a foreign government.
Thus, the actions by Donald Trump Jr. fall squarely within the definition of “solicit” and constitute a violation of the ban on soliciting a contribution from a foreign national. It is important to keep in mind, furthermore, that making the solicitation itself violates the law. Trump Jr. did not have to actually receive anything in response to the solicitation for the law to be broken.
In some ways it’s not surprising that Donald Trump Jr. violated the foreign national solicitation ban since the Trump presidential campaign repeatedly violated the ban during the 2016 presidential campaign.
These violations included solicitations for contributions that went to members of parliament in England, Scotland, Australia and Iceland. For example, members of the United Kingdom parliament received emails urging them to “make America great again” by donating to Trump’s campaign.
Trump campaign wouldn’t stop soliciting
In June 2016, Democracy 21 and the Campaign Legal Center filed a complaint with the FEC against the Trump campaign for violating the solicitation ban.
Nevertheless, the Trump campaign continued to make these blatantly illegal solicitations. One member of the UK’s parliament, for example, received three requests for contributions from the Trump campaign. He told The Hill that no one in the Trump campaign responded to his question about “why they were asking for financial support that I suppose to be illegal for [Trump] to accept.”
This led Democracy 21 and the Campaign Legal Center to file a second complaint, this time with the Justice Department, asking for a criminal investigation of the Trump campaign’s solicitation of foreign contributions. This also did not stop the Trump campaign from continuing to make illegal solicitations, including three fundraising requests that went to the former president of Mexico.
Trump and his campaign have shown disdain for our campaign-finance laws. They have taken the abject failure of the Federal Election Commission to enforce these laws as a license to ignore them.
Cohen’s plea agreement involving criminal campaign-finance violations, and the indictment of California Rep. Duncan Hunter for using his campaign funds as a personal bank account, may signal a new era in the enforcement of the nation’s campaign-finance laws. I certainly hope so.
Fred Wertheimer is founder and president of Democracy 21. Follow him on Twitter: @FredWertheimer
You can read diverse opinions from our Board of Contributors and other writers on the Opinion front page, on Twitter @usatodayopinion and in our daily Opinion newsletter. To respond to a column, submit a comment to letters@usatoday.com.
