Donald Trump Jr.’s testimony to Senate staffers about the now-infamous Trump Tower meeting in the summer of 2016 will soon be made public, Senator Charles Grassley said Thursday. So too will the testimony of everyone else who attended that meeting and has agreed to talk with the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Now that the interviews related to the meeting “are complete,” Grassley said he wants to get the transcripts “out to the public for everyone to see.”
Notably, there won’t be a transcript from an interview with Jared Kushner because he refused to sit down with the committee. Grassley said Thursday that Trump’s son-in-law and adviser is “spooked” and won’t voluntarily talk to the panel. He blamed Kushner’s reticence on Senator Dianne Feinstein’s decision to publicly release testimony from Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson, whose firm worked on the dossier that alleges ties between Trump and Russia.
“I had hoped to speak with all the witnesses surrounding the Trump Tower meeting before releasing any of those interview transcripts,” Grassley said. “But [Feinstein] unilaterally released the transcript of Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson. That has spooked other potential witnesses. As a result, it looks like our chances of getting a voluntary interview with Mr. Kushner have been shot.”
Grassley’s announcement comes just one day after Democratic senators on the Judiciary Committee asked that Trump Jr.’s testimony be shared with Robert Mueller. One of those Democrats, Senator Richard Blumenthal, predicted that once Trump Jr.’s testimony sees “the light of day,” it will be “explosive.”
