Dem senator claims she has never met or called Russian ambassador. Her Twitter feed begs to differ. What's the crime?

Dem senator claims she has never met or called Russian ambassador. Her Twitter feed begs to differ

Missouri Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill claimed Thursday that she has never, in her 10 years of serving on the Senate Armed Services Committee, had a call or met with the Russian ambassador to the United States. But there’s just one problem with her claim — two of them, actually.

“I’ve been on the Armed Services Com for 10 years. No call or meeting w/Russian ambassador. Ever. Ambassadors call members of Foreign Rel[ations] Com,” McCaskill tweeted Thursday morning.

It wasn’t long after McCaskill’s tweet Thursday morning that the National Review’s Charles Cooke dug up two other tweets from McCaskill, which directly contradicted her claim that she never met or spoke with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak.

“Off to meeting w/ Russian Ambassador,” McCaskill tweeted in January 2013. “Upset about the arbitrary/cruel decision to end all US adoptions, even those in process.”

Then, in August 2015, McCaskill tweeted that she had calls with the British, Russian and German ambassadors regarding the Iran nuclear deal.

After multiple news outlets pointed out the discrepancy, McCaskill clarified that she “never met one-on-one” with the Russian ambassador, adding that four years ago she was one “of many senators” who met with the ambassador.

McCaskill’s tweet came as several of her Democratic colleagues demanded Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ resignation for his alleged lies during his Senate confirmation hearings. Sessions denied during the hearings that he had any contact with Russian officials as part of President Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. 

However, the Washington Post reported Wednesday night that Sessions spoke twice with Kislyak, the Russian ambassador, last year.

Sarah Isgur Flores, spokeswoman for Sessions, later pointed out: “He [Sessions] was asked during the hearing about communications between Russia and the Trump campaign — not about meetings he took as a senator and a member of the Armed Services Committee.”

At least two leading congressional Republicans, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy from California and Rep. Jason Chaffetz from Utah, have called for Sessions to recuse himself from the Justice Department’s investigation into the Trump campaign’s alleged Russia ties.