Quote Originally Posted by Greyblades View Post
Actually the defense is: it's not illegal to seek out evidence of a presidential candidate's illegal action.

It's cant even be counted as collusion because Jr wasnt working for the campaign nor is he in official office.
The last part of your post might disculpate Trump himself, if he can argue that he wasn't in on the loop on what his son was doing. Without accidentily blurting out something self-incriminating, which wouldn't surprise me.

Beyond that: of course I don't know the relevant criminal statutes, but if what he did is not outright illegal I would be highly suprised. The email exchange establishes that:

- Rob Goldstone tried to set up a meeting between little Donald and a Russian government lawyer (that's the wording of the email)
- for the purpose of sharing incriminating information about Hillary Clinton (also explicitly stated in the exchange)
- for the benefit of his father's campaign (again, it says so literally in the exchange)
- little Donald acted so excited that I can only assume the exchange gave him a boner

As for the first part...he has defended himself by claiming this isn't any different from the opposition research that all politicians do on their opponents, a claim that has since then been contradicted by former campaign bosses from both the Democratic and Republican party. The general gist being: if somebody with ties to a foreign government offers to help you in a national election, you stay the hell away from it and in fact should call the FBI.