President Donald Trump’s discussions to build a skyscraper in Moscow extended until after he won the presidency, his lawyer Rudolph Giuliani said on Sunday.
Giuliani quoted Trump as saying that discussions on Trump Tower Moscow were “going on from the day I announced to the day I won” in an interview with the New York Times. He denied the report from Buzzfeed that Trump told his former lawyer Michael Cohen to lie about skyscraper negotiations to Congress but said the two men may have talked before Cohen testified.
It remains unclear when or if discussions about building Trump Tower Moscow officially ended. Trump’s aides continued meeting and having phone calls with Russians after he won, which special counsel Robert Mueller has been investigating. But the new report indicates that Trump was in talks for the deal when he was calling for an end to Russian sanctions and questioning the legitimacy of NATO.
Trump said in November that he saw nothing wrong with running for president and pursuing a business deal simultaneously.
“There was a good chance that I wouldn’t have won, in which case I would have gotten back into the business,” he said, “and why should I lose lots of opportunities?” [NYT] – Eddie Small