Judicial Watch Sues Department of Justice for Communications Relating to ‘Russian Lawyer’ Immigration Parole

Natalia Veselnitskaya, the Russian attorney who met with Donald Trump Jr. at Trump Tower, had her immigration parole refused for the period in which the meeting occurred

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today that it filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Justice for all records of communications relating to Russian attorney Natalia Veselnitskaya’s immigration parole. (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of Justice (No. 1:17-cv-02357)).

Judicial Watch filed suit after the Justice Department failed to respond to an August 4, 2017, FOIA request seeking

Any and all records of communications sent to or from officials in the Offices of the Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General regarding an immigration parole issued to Russian national Natalia Veselnitskaya between January 1, 2015 and December 31, 2016.

Fox News recently reported on a meeting between Fusion GPS and Veselnitskaya:

The co-founder of Fusion GPS, the firm behind the unverified Trump dossier, met with [Veselnitskaya] before and after a key meeting she had last year with Trump’s son, Fox News has learned. The contacts shed new light on how closely tied the firm was to Russian interests, at a time when it was financing research to discredit then-candidate Donald Trump.

The opposition research firm has faced renewed scrutiny after litigation revealed that the DNC and Hillary Clinton’s campaign paid for that research. Congressional Republicans have since questioned whether that politically financed research contributed to the FBI’s investigation of Russian collusion with the Trump campaign – making Fusion’s 2016 contacts with Russian interests all the more relevant.

“The ‘Russian lawyer’ who finagled a meeting with Donald Trump, Jr. evidently wasn’t supposed to be in the country,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “We want to know what the Obama Justice Department knew and when it knew about what Ms. Veselniskava was up to.”

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