--- title: Donald Trump Weighed in on Son's Meeting Statement, WH Says description: The White House confirmed Trump was involved in drafting a statement for his son after reports emerged of his meeting with a Russian lawyer canonical: https://time.com/4882937/white-house-donald-trump-jr-statement-natalia-veselnitskaya/ author: Alana Abramson article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-08-01T19:37:59.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T16:49:27.560Z article:section: Politics og:title: Trump Weighed in on Statement for His Son's Meeting With Russian Lawyer og:description: "The President weighed in as any father would" og:url: https://time.com/4882937/white-house-donald-trump-jr-statement-natalia-veselnitskaya/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc1a096334af1443b/6988d800bc6cfcf50e3e2797/trump-jr-trump.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3500 og:image:height: 1969 og:image:alt: Donald Trump Jr. watches his father Republican U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump leave the stage on the night of 2016 Iowa Caucus in Des Moines og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Trump Weighed in on Statement for His Son's Meeting With Russian Lawyer twitter:description: "The President weighed in as any father would" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc1a096334af1443b/6988d800bc6cfcf50e3e2797/trump-jr-trump.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # White House: President Trump Weighed In on Donald Trump Jr. Statement 'As Any Father Would' > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters.  by [Alana Abramson](https://time.com/author/alana-abramson/)  ## Alana Abramson Aug 1, 2017 7:37 PM UTC  Donald Trump Jr. (R) watches his father Republican U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump leave the stage on the night of the Iowa Caucus in Des Moines, Iowa on Feb. 1, 2016. Donald Trump Jr. (R) watches his father Republican U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump leave the stage on the night of the Iowa Caucus in Des Moines, Iowa on Feb. 1, 2016. Jim Bourg—Reuters  by [Alana Abramson](https://time.com/author/alana-abramson/)  ## Alana Abramson Aug 1, 2017 7:37 PM UTC The White House confirmed Tuesday that President Trump had been involved in drafting a statement for his son [Donald Trump Jr.](http://time.com/4868419/poll-donald-trump-jr-russia-meeting/) after reports emerged last month that he had met with a Russian lawyer during the 2016 campaign. “The statement that Don Jr. issued is true. The President weighed in as any father would based on the limited information that he had,” White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Tuesday at the daily press briefing. “This is all discussion frankly with no consequence. There was no follow up; it was disclosed to the proper parties, which is how the New York _Times_ found out about it to begin with.” “He certainly didn’t dictate,” Sanders continued, “but you know, he, like I said, he weighed in, offered suggestion, like any father would do. ” The _Washington Post_ [reported](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-dictated-sons-misleading-statement-on-meeting-with-russian-lawyer/2017/07/31/04c94f96-73ae-11e7-8f39-eeb7d3a2d304%5Fstory.html?utm%5Fterm=.0b1aae0b3819) Monday night that President Trump had “personally dictated” the initial statement from Donald Trump Jr. about his June 2016 meeting with Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya after the New York _Times_ broke the news about it. Trump’s statement said the two primarily discussed Russian adoption policy. Trump’s campaign manager at the time, Paul Manafort, attended the meeting, as did the President’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, who is now a Senior White House adviser. The New York _Times_ subsequently reported that Donald Trump Jr. had met with Veselnitskaya because he was promised compromising information about Hillary Clinton. After that report, the President’s son released his emails leading up to the meeting, which showed [he was promised](http://time.com/4853005/donald-trump-jr-emails-hillary-clinton-russia/) “very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump.” One of Trump’s lawyers, Jay Sekulow, told the _Post,_ “apart from being of no consequence, the characterizations are misinformed, inaccurate, and not pertinent.” Sanders said the focus on this meeting was part of a political ploy by the Democrats. “The Democrats want to continue to use this as a PR stunt and are doing everything they can to keep this alive and in the paper every single day,” she said. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4882937/white-house-donald-trump-jr-statement-natalia-veselnitskaya/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4882937/white-house-donald-trump-jr-statement-natalia-veselnitskaya/"},"headline":"White House: President Trump Weighed In on Donald Trump Jr. Statement 'As Any Father Would'","datePublished":"2017-08-01T19:37:59.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T16:49:27.560Z","description":"\"The President weighed in as any father would based on the limited information that he had\"","url":"https://time.com/4882937/white-house-donald-trump-jr-statement-natalia-veselnitskaya/","keywords":["White House","onetime","Russia Investigation"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc1a096334af1443b/6988d800bc6cfcf50e3e2797/trump-jr-trump.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Alana Abramson","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/alana-abramson/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc1a096334af1443b/6988d800bc6cfcf50e3e2797/trump-jr-trump.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Donald Trump Jr. watches his father Republican U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump leave the stage on the night of 2016 Iowa Caucus in Des Moines","caption":"Donald Trump Jr. watches his father Republican U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump leave the stage on the night of 2016 Iowa Caucus in Des Moines","creditText":"Jim Bourg—Reuters","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/white-house/","name":"White House"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4882937/white-house-donald-trump-jr-statement-natalia-veselnitskaya/","name":"White House: President Trump Weighed In on Donald Trump Jr. Statement 'As Any Father Would'"}}]}] ```