What Happened

On Oct. 30, documents were unsealed that detailed a guilty plea entered into by the defendant, George Papadopoulos, a former member of the foreign policy advisory panel to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. This guilty plea states that Papadopoulos knowingly and willingly made false statements when interviewed as part of the Russian probe. Papadopoulos specifically lied about Russian contacts he made in regard to supposed “dirt” on then-presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, that “dirt” being hacked emails.

In his initial claims to the FBI, Papadopulos stated that he had made connections with Russians and had communicated with them prior to his involvement with the Trump campaign. However, it was revealed in his guilty plea that his interactions with Russians actually occurred only after he became one of Trump’s foreign policy advisors. These actions are described in official court documents (Case 1:17-cr-00182-RDM) as, “Through his false statements and omissions, defendant PAPADOPOULOS impeded the FBI’s ongoing investigation into the existence of any links or coordination between individuals associated with the Campaign and the Russian government’s efforts to interfere with the 2016 presidential election.“