t It has been six months since news broke that investigators were looking into Jared Kushner’s meetings with foreign officials as part of their broad probe into whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia during the 2016 election. Since then, congressional committees have sifted through documents and called witnesses, including Kushner, to testify for hours on Capitol Hill. Last month, special counsel Robert Mueller handed down his first indictments, and he has begun interviewing a handful of key White House aides, turning up the heat on President Donald Trump’s inner circle.

Kushner has vociferously denied any collusion, despite his multiple meetings with Russian officials—formalities and part of the job, he claims—that went unreported on his security clearance form due to an alleged clerical error. But according to a report from The Wall Street Journal, Mueller and his team remain deeply interested in many of Kushner’s dealings. Specifically, investigators have been asking witnesses questions about Kushner’s involvement in a series of controversial events that transpired over the past year and a half, including Kushner’s role in firing former F.B.I. director James Comey, a decision that many believe was a fatal mistake, and which led to Mueller’s appointment. (Sources familiar with the situation confirm that Kushner supported his father-in-law’s choice.)

Investigators are also looking into Kushner’s role in setting up meetings and communications with foreign leaders during the transition, according to the Journal.Kushner, who met with more than 100 officials in that time period, said he had four meetings with Russians. One of those sit-downs was with Sergey Gorkov, chief executive at a Russian state-owned bank that was on a U.S. sanctions list over Russia’s annexation of Crimea. In an 11-page statement issued in July, Kushner said that he and Gorkov did not discuss sanctions or his family real-estate business in their brief-sit down at the end of last year, but Mueller’s team has reportedly questioned those around Kushner regarding the meeting.

Also of interest, the Journal reported, is Kushner’s involvement in a U.N. resolution passed last December condemning Israel’s settlement construction in disputed territories after Israeli officials asked Trump administration officials, including Kushner, to help block it, even though Trump had yet to take office.

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The insight into Mueller’s sustained interest in Kushner comes just days after congressional investigators expressed their frustration that Kushner may not have been completely forthcoming and truthful with two committees this summer in both his testimony and his document production. Last week, Senate Judiciary Committee leaders sent Kushner’s attorney, Abbe Lowell, a letter explaining that they are still missing documents they requested last month, adding that there are “several documents” known to exist that Lowell did not turn over in his initial production, including e-mails sent to Kushner last year about WikiLeaks, which Kushner then forwarded to another campaign official.

Despite evidence that he received and forwarded the e-mails in question, Kushner told congressional committees in July that he was unaware of any contact with the campaign and WikiLeaks. In response, Lowell said in a statement that “a communication in which he was a copied recipient and was not about Russia contacts by him (or apparently by anyone else) was not responsive to any request about Mr. Kushner’s own contacts.” On Monday, Lowell told CNN, “If you look at the content of these e-mails, he’s the hero . . . He’s the one who’s saying there shouldn’t be any contact with foreign officials or foreign entities.”

The swirl of suspicion around the West Wing princeling has had a chilling effect on what was once an expansive mandate to reform the government. In September, the Journalreported that Trump’s lawyers had suggested that Kushner resign, worried that his meetings with Russians and financial dealings could imperil the White House. As I reportedearlier this month, several sources have said that President Trump himself has repeatedly reminded the couple of what a nice life they had in New York before they were “getting killed” by the press in D.C.

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/11/justice-department-investigators-circling-jared-kushner