Sessions: Recusal ‘Not an Admission of Any Wrongdoing’

Attorney General Jeff Sessions was grilled Thursday night during an exclusive interview with Fox News host Tucker Carlson over the series of events and decisions that allowed political adversaries to explode his conversations in 2016 with the Russian ambassador into headline-dominating controversy.

“Did anyone on your staff say to you, ‘Holy smokes, perhaps we should clarify this’?”

Carlson noted the Russian controversy was already well underway at the time of Sessions’ hearing, and that only weeks later, National Security Adviser Michael Flynn was forced to resign due to conversations with the Russian ambassador.

“Why did no one from your staff come to you and say … ‘perhaps we should amend our statement to the Senate in order to avoid the problems Mike Flynn had’?” Carlson queried.

Sessions explained that he was responding to a long-winded, rambling question put to him by Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) about a “new story [that] had come out and said that various Trump surrogates were meeting continually with Russian officials as part of the campaign.”

“I never gave [amending my statement] a thought, never considered it. My answer went straight to that,” Sessions said.

“I had not had any such meetings — [I] was not meeting with Russian officials on a continuing basis to advance any campaign agenda,” he said. Sessions said he had met with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak in an official capacity as a U.S. senator and member of the Armed Services Committee.

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Tucker pushed Sessions on why no one thought those conversations might still have been problematic, considering what happened to Flynn.

“My point though is … a little over two weeks later, the national security adviser has to resign because of conversations he had — also in a capacity as a non-surrogate for the campaign — with the very same ambassador, so did anyone on your staff say to you, ‘Holy smokes, perhaps we should clarify this,’ because you could see how it could be a problem?” Carlson asked.

“No, I never gave that a thought … I don’t believe anyone ever mentioned that to me,” Sessions responded, before reemphasizing that nothing improper occurred during the meetings.

“I don’t recall any discussion of the campaign in any significant way, it was in no way some sort of coordinating of an effort, doing anything improper and I don’t believe anybody that was in that meeting would have seen or believed I said one thing that was improper or unwise,” Sessions said.

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Carlson then asked why Sessions had recused himself from the investigation into possible Russian attempts to influence the U.S. election.

“I understand your position is none of these conversations had anything to do with the campaign or your capacity as an adviser to the campaign but you have recused yourself, why?” Carlson asked.

“Tucker, we had started when I got confirmed, I told the Senate during that process that I would review issues before me to determine whether I should recuse myself,” Sessions responded. “Recusal is not an admission of any wrongdoing, it’s simply … whether or not you can be perceived as fairly deciding a case or evaluating a case.”