Donald Trump Jr. Asks for Investigation Into House Probe Leaks

(Bloomberg) -- Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son, is seeking an investigation into leaks related to his interview last week with a congressional panel probing Russian efforts to meddle in the 2016 election.

Details of his eight-hour session with the House Intelligence Committee on Dec. 6 were leaked during and after the interview, despite assurances that his comments, which were under oath, would be kept confidential, Trump Jr.’s lawyer Alan Futerfas said in a letter to Representative Michael Conaway, chairman of the committee. Futerfas said the leaks undermined the committee and "warrant examination."

Several hours into the interview, CNN reported that Trump Jr. said that he had spoken with White House communications director Hope Hicks about his response to reporters’ questions about a 2016 meeting at Trump Tower with a Russian lawyer. 

After Trump Jr.’s appearance, the committee’s top Democrat, Adam Schiff, told reporters that Trump Jr. refused to answer some questions about his conversations with his father, citing attorney-client privilege. Later that evening, Democratic members of the committee appeared on television discussing some details of Trump Jr.’s interview.

Days later, an email Trump had turned over to the committee was leaked with the wrong date, leading to an inaccurate CNN report suggesting Trump knew about hacked emails before they were released publicly by Wikileaks.

Trump had been assured prior to the interview that the House Intelligence Committee would keep it confidential unless the full committee voted to release the transcript, Futerfas said in the letter.

Representative Michael Conaway of Texas, the Republican leading the committee’s Russia investigation, said the panel received Trump Jr.’s letter and “we’ll work on a response.”

Schiff of California and his staff didn’t leak classified or confidential information, said his spokesman, Patrick Boland.

“Any disclosure of non-public information by the congressional committees undertaking investigations is singularly unhelpful,” Boland said.

--With assistance from Billy House

To contact the reporters on this story: Shannon Pettypiece in New York at spettypiece@bloomberg.net, Kevin Cirilli in Washington at kcirilli@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alex Wayne at awayne3@bloomberg.net, Justin Blum, Kevin Whitelaw

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