After Wednesday’s breaking news report revealing that Attorney General Jeff Sessions lied to Congress about his contacts with the Russian ambassador, Richard Painter, the former White House ethics lawyer to President George W. Bush from 2005 to 2007, took to Twitter and said Sessions’ actions are “a good way to go to jail.”
Painter then appeared on CNN’s New Day this Thursday and continued his critique of Sessions, saying that it’s clear he “didn’t tell the truth.”
“He needed to to disclose the communications that he had with the Russians, if he indeed did have communications with the Russians. That was the clear point of the question,” Painter told host Chris Cuomo.
Painter said he thought it was highly unusual for Sessions, who was a member of the Armed Services Committee at the time of his alleged communications with the Russian Ambassador, to be having that kind of contact.
“I don’t understand why a member of the Senate Armed Services committee is having unilateral discussions with the Russians,” Painter said. “That’s a big problem in the Senate Armed Services Committee if that’s going on and you have at least one senator [Claire McCaskill] willing to say she’s not doing that.”
“You think Sessions should resign?” Cuomo asked.
“Based on what I’m hearing thus far, yes…” Painter responded.
“This is serious stuff what’s going on with the Russians,” he added.
“We’ve already had [former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn] have to resign for lying about contacts with the Russians … and now we have another one who seems to have trouble telling the truth about what he’s saying to the Russians, and that’s just not acceptable.”
Watch the clip above.
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