New York Times: Trump is a Russian Asset

Intelligencer wrote:Mueller Is Investigating Trump as a Russian Asset
By Jonathan Chait@jonathanchait



Friday night, the New York Times published a bombshell report that the FBI has been investigating whether US Failing President Trump “had been working on behalf of Russia against American interests.” The story reframes the focus and purpose of the investigation now headed by Robert Mueller. The probe is not just about Russian election interference, or about Trump’s obstruction of the probe — it is about the secret relationship between Trump and Russia that appears to be causing both these things to happen.

The first question to ask yourself when absorbing this story is, what does it mean for a president to be working for Russia, and against the United States? Trump frequently says the United States would be better off if it got along better with Russia — and that position, right or wrong, is certainly not criminally suspect. Presidents obviously have the right to change American foreign policy, and to forge friendships with countries that had been previously hostile. Nixon’s overtures to China, or Obama’s opening of relations with Cuba, did not set off criminal investigations. The FBI would not investigate a president simply for harboring friendly views of a rival state.

The potential that Trump is working on behalf of Russia, therefore, by definition posits some kind of corrupt secret relationship. That is to say, it’s an investigation into whether Trump is a Russian asset.

When I wrote about this last summer, much of the pushback centered on the imagined accusation that Trump is a Russian “agent.” He is obviously not. An agent is not the same thing as an asset. An asset can describe a wide range of relationships, but in Trump’s case, it would mean that he is subject to sexual or financial blackmail, along with possibly some form of back-channel propaganda. We know for a fact that Trump is vulnerable to sexual blackmail, but that kind of leverage, if it exists, would be difficult for Mueller to obtain. (Sexual blackmail is only useful if you keep it locked up tightly.) It’s far more likely that Trump’s financial vulnerability opened him up to Russian leverage. And that is the kind of information American investigators can access.

A somewhat related issue is the question of whether Russia has some kind of back channel to shape Trump’s thinking. Trump has met with Russian officials since 1987. It was after his first trip to Moscow that he first contemplated running for president. It is well within the realm of possibility that Russians used blackmail, bribes, or perhaps just simple flattery to help shape his thinking on world affairs.

It is hard to understand how else some of the idiosyncratic and bizarrely Russpohillic ideas he routinely spouts have found their way into Trump’s brain. His warning that tiny Montenegro is a threat to attack Russia, or his claim that the Soviet Union was right to invade Afghanistan in 1979, are not notions Trump would pick up from his normal routine of binge-watching Fox News.

Much of the public focus on the Mueller investigation has centered on campaign collusion. Russia worked to help elect Trump, and Trump and his campaign at minimum welcomed its help, and at maximum, actively participated. (Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort gave polling data to a Russian oligarch, the most likely use for which would have been guiding Russian social media efforts.) But campaign collusion is a relationship with a fixed endpoint: November 8, 2016. After Trump won presidency, any secretive or suspicious mutual interest between him and Vladimir Putin would conclude. Having succeeded in helping to elect the friendly Trump (and block the unfriendly Clinton), Putin could now operate with his chosen candidate on a normal president-to-president basis.

The Times report tells us that collusion is only part of the story. The relationship between Trump and Putin did not merely rest on their mutual interest in the Trump campaign defeating Clinton, but indicates some deeper connection. From the very beginning of this story, pundits have underestimated the full extent of Trump’s ties to Russia and how much deeper the story might yet go. Now we already know Mueller is not merely looking into crimes, but trying to ascertain the foundational loyalties of the President of the United States.

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/01/mueller-investigating-trump-russian-asset.html

Original Quill wrote:I looked for it, but by now its lost in the subsequent reporting.  So I just chose the one (Intelligencer) that approximates it.  The facts are the real story.

Feel free to find it, and post it here.  I wouldn't mind, and in fact I would appreciate it.

Didge wrote:If guilty of such a crime, he should be tried for treason

News Site wrote:The FBI Reportedly Started Investigating Whether Trump Was A Russian Asset After He Fired Comey

January 12, 2019

The FBI reportedly grew so concerned about some of Failing Cheeto-Faced Ferret-Wearing Shit Gibbon’s early actions and public statements in office — including his move to fire director James Comey — the agency opened a counterintelligence inquiry on the matter.

According to a New York Times report published Friday night, Trump’s actions and behaviors had national-security implications, including whether Trump was intentionally or unintentionally undermining US interests at the behest of Russia.

The development adds a new wrinkle to the broader Russia investigation in which US law-enforcement officials are looking into the extent of Russia’s wide-ranging effort to influence the 2016 presidential election.

After Trump fired FBI director James Comey in May 2017, the bureau became so concerned about his actions that it opened a counterintelligence investigation into whether Trump was intentionally or unintentionally working for the Russians, according to a bombshell New York Times report.

FBI agents had already been suspicious of Trump’s ties to Russia since his 2016 presidential campaign but, according to The Times’ sources, there was some concerns within the agency about how to approach the situation given its sensitivity.

Trump’s move to fire Comey also triggered a criminal obstruction-of-justice inquiry, a matter that has only escalated since the special counsel Robert Mueller was appointed to oversee the Russia probe in May 2017.

Read more: Here are all the key developments you might have missed in Russia news this week

Trump’s interview with NBC News’ Lester Holt in May 2017, in which the president confessed he had asked Comey whether he was under investigation for his alleged links to Russia, raised alarms at the FBI and fueled the counterintelligence inquiry, according to The Times.

Trump’s other public statements, including encouraging Russia to hack his Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton’s emails, also attracted scrutiny from the FBI, the newspaper’s sources reportedly said.

It is unclear whether Mueller is still looking into the counterintelligence aspect of the investigation, according to The Times.

Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani, who the newspaper said had no knowledge of the FBI inquiry, appeared to be unfazed: “The fact that it goes back a year and a half and nothing came of it that showed a breach of national security means they found nothing,” he said to The Times.

Trump has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and frequently rails against Mueller and the Russia investigation.

Thor wrote:

Original Quill wrote:I looked for it, but by now its lost in the subsequent reporting.  So I just chose the one (Intelligencer) that approximates it.  The facts are the real story.

Feel free to find it, and post it here.  I wouldn't mind, and in fact I would appreciate it.

Odd, that you take this story as facts and never look skeptically, as you claimed previously with the media?

Seems you pick and choose what to believe Quill

Lets see how this pans out eh?

If guilty of such a crime, he should be tried for treason

Maddog wrote:

Thor wrote:


Odd, that you take this story as facts and never look skeptically, as you claimed previously with the media?

Seems you pick and choose what to believe Quill

Lets see how this pans out eh?

If guilty of such a crime, he should be tried for treason

Maybe the real Trump is in a vegetative state somewhere in Russia and this Trump is actually a clone?

>THE Ben Reilly< wrote:To be fair, he was (or perhaps still is) under investigation - there's no definite, public answer to the question as to whether Trump is a Russian asset.

To also be fair, the fact that the FBI even launched an investigation is jaw-dropping.

>THE Ben Reilly< wrote:To be fair, he was (or perhaps still is) under investigation - there's no definite, public answer to the question as to whether Trump is a Russian asset.

To also be fair, the fact that the FBI even launched an investigation is jaw-dropping.

Maddog wrote:

>THE Ben Reilly< wrote:To be fair, he was (or perhaps still is) under investigation - there's no definite, public answer to the question as to whether Trump is a Russian asset.

To also be fair, the fact that the FBI even launched an investigation is jaw-dropping.

Do we even know if the FBI is investigating  him for being a Russian asset. 

The "orange man bad" mentality  has forced the media to walk back things in this case.  

Do we have something from the FBI confirming this?

Original Quill wrote:Trump has already been declared guilty in a Manhattan United States District Court.  Because a president cannot be indicted under DOJ rules, he is only identified as "individual 1".   But he's right in there, conspiring with a co-conspirator, Trump's lawyer, who is already sentenced to 3-years.

Thor wrote:

Original Quill wrote:Trump has already been declared guilty in a Manhattan United States District Court.  Because a president cannot be indicted under DOJ rules, he is only identified as "individual 1".   But he's right in there, conspiring with a co-conspirator, Trump's lawyer, who is already sentenced to 3-years.

Guilty of what?

CNN wrote:(CNN)Federal prosecutors are preparing criminal charges against President Donald J. Trump's former lawyer Michael Cohen and could announce them by the end of the month, people familiar with the matter tell CNN.

The US Attorney's office for the Southern District of New York has been investigating Cohen for possible bank and tax fraud and campaign finance violations related in part to a $130,000 hush money payment made to silence porn star Stormy Daniels' allegations of an affair with Trump. Trump has denied an affair.

Original Quill wrote:

Thor wrote:

Guilty of what?

CNN wrote:(CNN)Federal prosecutors are preparing criminal charges against President Donald J. Trump's former lawyer Michael Cohen and could announce them by the end of the month, people familiar with the matter tell CNN.

The US Attorney's office for the Southern District of New York has been investigating Cohen for possible bank and tax fraud and campaign finance violations related in part to a $130,000 hush money payment made to silence porn star Stormy Daniels' allegations of an affair with Trump. Trump has denied an affair.

That was in August of last year.  Cohen may be up for more charges arising out of the attempts to build the Trump Tower in Moscow.  The investigation is on-going.  Cohen tape-recorded many telephone and other conversations with the president.

>THE Ben Reilly< wrote:

Maddog wrote:

Do we even know if the FBI is investigating  him for being a Russian asset. 

The "orange man bad" mentality  has forced the media to walk back things in this case.  

Do we have something from the FBI confirming this?

Guilliani appears to acknowledge that the investigation was opened, in the article from the Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/11/us/politics/fbi-trump-russia-inquiry.html

Maddog wrote:

>THE Ben Reilly< wrote:

Guilliani appears to acknowledge that the investigation was opened, in the article from the Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/11/us/politics/fbi-trump-russia-inquiry.html

Ok, so they took a look-see.  

And reported back this.  

"No evidence has emerged publicly that Mr. Trump was secretly in contact with or took direction from Russian government officials. An F.B.I. spokeswoman and a spokesman for the special counsel’s office both declined to comment."

Original Quill wrote:

Maddog wrote:
Ok, so they took a look-see.  

And reported back this.  

"No evidence has emerged publicly that Mr. Trump was secretly in contact with or took direction from Russian government officials. An F.B.I. spokeswoman and a spokesman for the special counsel’s office both declined to comment."

Remember when all those redactions showed up in federal pleadings, on September/October?  Everyone was all a-titter as to what they were.  What did I say?  I said there were three cases, one is a secret case.

So, the public cases would be conspiracy (or collusion), and obstruction, and now we know what the other investigation was...and why they wouldn't talk about it.

It was a counter-espionage case against the Russians and Trump.  This is what the New York Times is now reporting upon.

Maddog wrote:

>THE Ben Reilly< wrote:

Maddog wrote:

Do we even know if the FBI is investigating  him for being a Russian asset. 

The "orange man bad" mentality  has forced the media to walk back things in this case.  

Do we have something from the FBI confirming this?

Guilliani appears to acknowledge that the investigation was opened, in the article from the Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/11/us/politics/fbi-trump-russia-inquiry.html

Ok, so they took a look-see.  

And reported back this.  

"No evidence has emerged publicly that Mr. Trump was secretly in contact with or took direction from Russian government officials. An F.B.I. spokeswoman and a spokesman for the special counsel’s office both declined to comment."

>THE Ben Reilly< wrote:

Maddog wrote:
Ok, so they took a look-see.  

And reported back this.  

"No evidence has emerged publicly that Mr. Trump was secretly in contact with or took direction from Russian government officials. An F.B.I. spokeswoman and a spokesman for the special counsel’s office both declined to comment."

Well, the keyword here is "publicly."

And it's interesting that the FBI declines to comment. Usually that means they have information they don't want made public.

Obviously if there's nothing there, Trump would LOVE for them to publicly comment, "There's nothing there."

Without a doubt, this has been a most productive week for Trump. We have proven collusion with Russia, obstruction of justice, lying to federal agents, espionage, mail and wire fraud, computer fraud and abuse act violations, lying to Congress, and foreign corrupt practices act, with Russian infiltration into the NRA, and conspiracy against the US. And that's just in one week.

What's on for next week?

http://www.newsfixboard.com/t25780-trump-s-lawyer-gets-3-years

Maddog wrote:

Original Quill wrote:

Maddog wrote:
Ok, so they took a look-see.  

And reported back this.  

"No evidence has emerged publicly that Mr. Trump was secretly in contact with or took direction from Russian government officials. An F.B.I. spokeswoman and a spokesman for the special counsel’s office both declined to comment."

Remember when all those redactions showed up in federal pleadings, on September/October?  Everyone was all a-titter as to what they were.  What did I say?  I said there were three cases, one is a secret case.

So, the public cases would be conspiracy (or collusion), and obstruction, and now we know what the other investigation was...and why they wouldn't talk about it.

It was a counter-espionage case against the Russians and Trump.  This is what the New York Times is now reporting upon.

I remember you blabbering about how Trump would soon be gone almost 2 years ago. You bloviate a bunch of nonsense while you run around her like screaming like the boy who cried wolf.  

Give it a fucking rest.  Wait until some charges are filed. Than there will be something to discuss, beyond "orange man bad".

Maddog wrote:

>THE Ben Reilly< wrote:

Maddog wrote:
Ok, so they took a look-see.  

And reported back this.  

"No evidence has emerged publicly that Mr. Trump was secretly in contact with or took direction from Russian government officials. An F.B.I. spokeswoman and a spokesman for the special counsel’s office both declined to comment."

Well, the keyword here is "publicly."

And it's interesting that the FBI declines to comment. Usually that means they have information they don't want made public.

Obviously if there's nothing there, Trump would LOVE for them to publicly comment, "There's nothing there."

It could mean anything.  

I'm about 98% sure Trump  finishes out his term, under all sorts if pressure from the House. If he runs again, he should lose handily, but I never underestimate the Democrats ability to really fuck shit up. It appears they are doing all they can to keep it close.

>THE Ben Reilly< wrote:

Maddog wrote:

It could mean anything.  

I'm about 98% sure Trump  finishes out his term, under all sorts if pressure from the House. If he runs again, he should lose handily, but I never underestimate the Democrats ability to really fuck shit up. It appears they are doing all they can to keep it close.

Yeah, I agree with most of what you said, but it doesn't actually address what I said.

The one thing I have to take issue with is "It could mean anything." I have enough experience in the media, dealing with law enforcement, to know how they operate - at least most of the time. This is, obviously, uncharted territory.

But generally when the cops are working, they don't talk. When they're done, they spill.

If they haven't commented yet, it's a pretty good indicator that they're not done yet.

Maddog wrote:

>THE Ben Reilly< wrote:

Maddog wrote:

It could mean anything.  

I'm about 98% sure Trump  finishes out his term, under all sorts if pressure from the House. If he runs again, he should lose handily, but I never underestimate the Democrats ability to really fuck shit up. It appears they are doing all they can to keep it close.

Yeah, I agree with most of what you said, but it doesn't actually address what I said.

The one thing I have to take issue with is "It could mean anything." I have enough experience in the media, dealing with law enforcement, to know how they operate - at least most of the time. This is, obviously, uncharted territory.

But generally when the cops are working, they don't talk. When they're done, they spill.

If they haven't commented yet, it's a pretty good indicator that they're not done yet.

Oh, I don't think they are done. I just think they have found anything yet.  Maybe they will, but I think it would have been found by now.  

I don't doubt Trump broke some campaign rules.  They probably won't be serious enough to remove him.  

>THE Ben Reilly< wrote:

Maddog wrote:


Oh, I don't think they are done. I just think they have found anything yet.  Maybe they will, but I think it would have been found by now.  

I don't doubt Trump broke some campaign rules.  They probably won't be serious enough to remove him.  

You think they do rush jobs when it comes to the president of the United States?

How long did Watergate take?

>THE Ben Reilly< wrote:Actually you're right in that Watergate didn't take quite as long as the Mueller investigation has, but there was a special prosecutor. Maybe Trump could speed up the process by firing Mueller, Nixon style.

Or maybe he could be open and honest about what he's done and stop stonewalling.

>THE Ben Reilly< wrote:Actually you're right in that Watergate didn't take quite as long as the Mueller investigation has, but there was a special prosecutor. Maybe Trump could speed up the process by firing Mueller, Nixon style.

Or maybe he could be open and honest about what he's done and stop stonewalling.

Washington Post wrote:Trump has concealed details of his face-to-face encounters with Putin from senior officials in administration

Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images)
By Greg Miller January 13 at 8:30 AM

Cheeto-Faced Ferret-Wearing Shit Gibbon has gone to extraordinary lengths to conceal details of his conversations with Russian President Vladi­mir Putin, including on at least one occasion taking possession of the notes of his own interpreter and instructing the linguist not to discuss what had transpired with other administration officials, current and former U.S. officials said.

Trump did so after a meeting with Putin in 2017 in Hamburg that was also attended by then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. U.S. officials learned of Trump’s actions when a White House adviser and a senior State Department official sought information from the interpreter beyond a readout shared by Tillerson.

The constraints that Trump imposed are part of a broader pattern by the president of shielding his communications with Putin from public scrutiny and preventing even high-ranking officials in his own administration from fully knowing what he has told one of the United States’ main adversaries.

As a result, U.S. officials said there is no detailed record, even in classified files, of Trump’s face-to-face interactions with the Russian leader at five locations over the past two years. Such a gap would be unusual in any presidency, let alone one that Russia sought to install through what U.S. intelligence agencies have described as an unprecedented campaign of election interference.

Special counsel Robert S. Mueller III is thought to be in the final stages of an investigation that has focused largely on whether Trump or his associates conspired with Russia during the 2016 presidential campaign. The new details about Trump’s continued secrecy underscore the extent to which little is known about his communications with Putin since becoming president.

After this story was published online, Trump said in an interview late Saturday with Fox News host Jeanine Pirro that he did not take particular steps to conceal his private meetings with Putin and attacked The Washington Post and its owner Jeffrey P. Bezos.

He said he talked with Putin about Israel, among other subjects. “Anyone could have listened to that meeting. That meeting is open for grabs,” he said, without offering specifics.

When Pirro asked if he is or has ever been working for Russia, Trump responded, “I think it’s the most insulting thing I’ve ever been asked.”

Former U.S. officials said that Trump’s behavior is at odds with the known practices of previous presidents, who have relied on senior aides to witness meetings and take comprehensive notes then shared with other officials and departments.

Trump’s secrecy surrounding Putin “is not only unusual by historical standards, it is outrageous,” said Strobe Talbott, a former deputy secretary of state now at the Brookings Institution, who participated in more than a dozen meetings between President Bill Clinton and then-Russian President Boris Yeltsin in the 1990s. “It handicaps the U.S. government — the experts and advisers and Cabinet officers who are there to serve [the president] — and it certainly gives Putin much more scope to manipulate Trump.”

A White House spokesman disputed that characterization and said that the Trump administration has sought to “improve the relationship with Russia” after the Obama administration “pursued a flawed ‘reset’ policy that sought engagement for the sake of engagement.”

The Trump administration “has imposed significant new sanctions in response to Russian malign activities,” said the spokesman, who spoke on the condition of anonymity and noted that Tillerson in 2017 “gave a fulsome readout of the meeting immediately afterward to other U.S. officials in a private setting, as well as a readout to the press.”

Trump allies said the president thinks the presence of subordinates impairs his ability to establish a rapport with Putin and that his desire for secrecy may also be driven by embarrassing leaks that occurred early in his presidency.

The meeting in Hamburg happened several months after The Washington Post and other news organizations revealed details about what Trump had told senior Russian officials during a meeting with Russian officials in the Oval Office. Trump disclosed classified information about a terrorism plot, called former FBI director James B. Comey a “nut job” and said that firing Comey had removed “great pressure” on his relationship with Russia.

The White House launched internal leak hunts after that and other episodes and sharply curtailed the distribution within the National Security Council of memos on the president’s interactions with foreign leaders.

“Over time it got harder and harder, I think, because of a sense from Trump himself that the leaks of the call transcripts were harmful to him,” said a former administration official.

Senior Democratic lawmakers describe the cloak of secrecy surrounding Trump’s meetings with Putin as unprecedented and disturbing.

Rep. Eliot L. Engel (D-N.Y.), the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said in an interview that his panel will form an investigative subcommittee whose targets will include seeking State Department records of Trump’s encounters with Putin, including a closed-door meeting with the Russian leader in Helsinki last summer.

“It’s been several months since Helsinki and we still don’t know what went on in that meeting,” Engel said. “It’s appalling. It just makes you want to scratch your head.”

The concerns have been compounded by actions and positions Trump has taken as president that are seen as favorable to the Kremlin. He has dismissed Russia’s election interference as a “hoax,” suggested that Russia was entitled to annex Crimea, repeatedly attacked NATO allies, resisted efforts to impose sanctions on Moscow, and begun to pull U.S. forces out of Syria — a move that critics see as effectively ceding ground to Russia.

At the same time, Trump’s decision to fire Comey and other attempts to contain the ongoing Russia investigation led the bureau in May 2017 to launch a counterintelligence investigation into whether he was seeking to help Russia and if so, why, a step first reported by the New York Times.

It is not clear whether Trump has taken notes from interpreters on other occasions, but several officials said they were never able to get a reliable readout of the president’s two-hour meeting in Helsinki. Unlike in Hamburg, Trump allowed no Cabinet officials or any aides to be in the room for that conversation.

Trump also had other private conversations with Putin at meetings of global leaders outside the presence of aides. He spoke at length with Putin at a banquet at the same 2017 global conference in Hamburg, where only Putin’s interpreter was present. Trump also had a brief conversation with ­Putin at a Group of 20 summit in Buenos Aires last month.

Trump generally has allowed aides to listen to his phone conversations with Putin, although Russia has often been first to disclose those calls when they occur and release statements characterizing them in broad terms favorable to the Kremlin.

In an email, Tillerson said that he “was present for the entirety of the two presidents’ official bilateral meeting in Hamburg,” but he declined to discuss the meeting and did not respond to questions about whether Trump had instructed the interpreter to remain silent or had taken the interpreter’s notes.

In a news conference afterward, Tillerson said that the Trump-Putin meeting lasted more than two hours, covered the war in Syria and other subjects, and that Trump had “pressed President ­Putin on more than one occasion regarding Russian involvement” in election interference. “President Putin denied such involvement, as I think he has in the past,” Tillerson said.

Tillerson refused to say during the news conference whether Trump had rejected Putin’s claim or indicated that he believed the conclusion of U.S. intelligence agencies that Russia had interfered.

Tillerson’s account is at odds with the only detail that other administration officials were able to get from the interpreter, officials said. Though the interpreter refused to discuss the meeting, officials said, he conceded that Putin had denied any Russian involvement in the U.S. election and that Trump responded by saying, “I believe you.”

A White House spokesperson, responding to this detail from the Hamburg meeting, said: “The President has affirmed that he supports the conclusions in the 2017 Intel Community Assessment, and the President also issued a new executive order in September 2018 to ensure a whole of government effort to address any foreign attempts to interfere in US elections.”

Senior Trump administration officials said that White House officials including then-National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster were never able to obtain a comprehensive account of the meeting, even from Tillerson.

“We were frustrated because we didn’t get a readout,” a former senior administration official said. “The State Department and [National Security Council] were never comfortable” with Trump’s interactions with Putin, the official said. “God only knows what they were going to talk about or agree to.”

Because of the absence of any reliable record of Trump’s conversations with Putin, officials at times have had to rely on reports by U.S. intelligence agencies tracking the reaction in the Kremlin.

Previous presidents and senior advisers have often studied such reports to assess whether they had accomplished their objectives in meetings as well as to gain insights for future conversations.

U.S. intelligence agencies have been reluctant to call attention to such reports during Trump’s presidency because they have at times included comments by foreign officials disparaging the president or his advisers, including his son-in-law Jared Kushner, a former senior administration official said.

“There was more of a reticence in the intelligence community going after those kinds of communications and reporting them,” said a former administration official who worked in the White House. “The feedback tended not to be positive.”

The interpreter at Hamburg revealed the restrictions that Trump had imposed when he was approached by administration officials at the hotel where the U.S. delegation was staying, officials said.

Among the officials who asked for details from the meeting were Fiona Hill, the senior Russia adviser at the NSC, and John Heffern, who was then serving at State as the acting assistant secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs.

The State Department did not respond to a request for comment from the interpreter. Heffern, who retired from State in 2017, declined to comment.

Through a spokesman, Hill declined a request for an interview.

There are conflicting accounts of the purpose of the conversation with the interpreter, with some officials saying that Hill was among those briefed by Tillerson and that she was merely seeking more nuanced information from the interpreter.

Others said the aim was to get a more meaningful readout than the scant information furnished by Tillerson. “I recall Fiona reporting that to me,” one former official said. A second former official present in Hamburg said that Tillerson “didn’t offer a briefing or call the ambassador or anybody together. He didn’t brief senior staff,” although he “gave a readout to the press.”

A similar issue arose in Helsinki, the setting for the first formal U.S.-Russia summit since Trump became president. Hill, national security adviser John Bolton and other U.S. officials took part in a preliminary meeting that included Trump, Putin and other senior Russian officials.

But Trump and Putin then met for two hours in private, accompanied only by their interpreters. Trump’s interpreter, Marina Gross, could be seen emerging from the meeting with pages of notes.

Alarmed by the secrecy of Trump’s meeting with Putin, several lawmakers subsequently sought to compel Gross to testify before Congress about what she witnessed. Others argued that forcing her to do so would violate the impartial role that interpreters play in diplomacy. Gross was not forced to testify. She was identified when members of Congress sought to speak with her. The interpreter in Hamburg has not been identified.

During a joint news conference with Putin afterward, Trump acknowledged discussing Syria policy and other subjects but also lashed out at the media and federal investigators, and he seemed to reject the findings of U.S. intelligence agencies by saying that he was persuaded by Putin’s “powerful” denial of election interference.

Previous presidents have required senior aides to attend meetings with adversaries including the Russian president largely to ensure that there are not misunderstandings and that others in the administration are able to follow up on any agreements or plans. Detailed notes that Talbot took of Clinton’s meetings with Yeltsin are among hundreds of documents declassified and released last year.

John Hudson, Josh Dawsey and Julie Tate contributed to this report.