The Trump ally told the special counsel a different story than what he said in sworn testimony on Capitol Hill, officials believe.
By Shane Harris and Shane Harris Intelligence and national security reporter Email Bio Follow Karoun Demirjian Karoun Demirjian Congressional reporter focusing on national security Email Bio Follow April 19 at 7:19 PM Nine days before Donald Trump took the oath of office, Erik Prince, the billionaire founder of the private military contractor Blackwater and a Trump ally, met in the Seychelles islands with a Russian financier close to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Mueller’s report on Russian interference in the 2016 election provides new details about Prince’s trip to the Seychelles, an archipelago in the Indian Ocean, which was included in the special counsel’s examination of contacts between Trump associates and Kremlin emissaries.
The proffer would not, however, shield him from legal jeopardy for separate statements to Congress if they were found to be false. In his interview with Mueller’s investigators, Prince said he told Dmitriev he provided policy papers to Bannon. Nader, trying to entice Dmitriev to take the meeting, “assured him that Prince wielded influence with the incoming Administration,” Mueller wrote.
At the meeting, “Prince described the eight years of the Obama Administration in negative terms, and stated that he was looking forward to a new era of cooperation and conflict resolution,” Mueller found, another indication that Prince was acting in a political capacity. Through UAE contacts, Dmitriev separately arranged an introduction in November 2016 to Rick Gerson, a hedge fund manager and friend of Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law.
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