In this video, CNN’s Jake Tapper drills down on then-Sen. Jeff Sessions statement that he “did not have communications with the Russians” during the 2016 presidential campaign.
Sessions, who is now the U.S. attorney general, made that comment at a Jan. 10 Senate hearing on his nomination as attorney general, in response to questions posed by Democratic Sen. Al Franken. But, since then, Sessions has acknowledged that he met twice with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak in 2016, including privately in his Senate office on Sept. 8.
In a press conference on March 2, Sessions said his response at the hearing was “honest” in the context of Franken’s question, because he met with Kislyak in his capacity as a senator, not a campaign surrogate. “Let me be clear, I never had meetings with Russian operatives or Russian intermediaries about the Trump campaign,” Sessions said.
This video is part of our fact-checking collaboration with CNN’s “State of the Union.” Past videos are available on FactCheck.org.