Trump's son-in-law and former presidential advisor Jared Kushner was criticized after he dodged questions about the Federal Bureau of Investigation's (FBI) recent search of former Republican President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort.
Agents earlier this month combed through Trump's home turned paid membership resort on a hunt for documents Trump took from the White House in violation of federal laws and presidential protocol.
When asked by Fox News personality Steve Doocy about a recent New York Times piece that reported there were "more than 300 classified documents at Mar-a-Lago over the last year or so" Kushner could not provide a coherent answer.
You can watch the exchange in the video below.
\u201cSteve Doocy: Why would the former president have that many classified things at Mar-a-Lago?\n\nJared Kushner: So I'm not familiar with what exactly the contents were.\u201d— Aaron Rupar (@Aaron Rupar) 1661259048
When Doocy asked him why would Trump "have that many classified things at Mar-a-Lago," Kushner said:
"So I'm not familiar about what the contents were but I'll say from my personal experience, again, in the campaign and in the transition we had a very innocent meeting with the Russian ambassador and then, you know, four months later you're reading that the intel agencies are leaking to The Washington Post that we requested this secret back channel."
"And then the New York Times and CNN go crazy for a weekend accusing us of treason and then it turns out such a thing never really happened and so I think you have to be really careful about what you read and obviously just wait for the facts to develop but I mean there's so many things that have been hyperventilated about over the last years that turned out to be nothing."
Kushner was referring to a 2017 report he attempted to establish a "back-channel" line of communication between Russia and his father-in-law's presidential transition team.
A few months after the report was published, he said in a statement to the Senate and House Intelligence Committees he had only “limited contacts” with Russian representatives and denied colluding with the Russian government to influence the 2016 general election result.
Those reports were never disproven, contrary to Kushner's claim.
Kushner continued to deflect during his Fox News interview, going on to talk about his book Breaking History, a memoir about his time in the White House.
Earlier this week his book was the subject of a scathing review in The New York Times for its revisionist history of the Trump administration.
\u201cJared Kushner is peddling a book he didn\u2019t write to people who don\u2019t read.\u201d— Windsor Mann (@Windsor Mann) 1661275729
Of his book, Kushner said he "really wanted people to understand what it was like living through that when you know you've done nothing wrong."
He added:
"You're there trying to get good things done and people are out there, you know, accusing you of all these crazy things and you have to prove that they didn't happen."
But nothing in Kushner's response addressed Doocy's question.
Kushner was almost immediately skewered for it.
\u201cKushner lying through his teeth\u201d— Macsmart3 (@Macsmart3) 1661273703
\u201cWhy hasn't there been a raid on Jared Kushner's house. What did Jared pack up and take home from the White House? $2 billion did not come out of thin air.\u201d— Santiago Ph.D. (@Santiago Ph.D.) 1661350157
\u201cCallin' Jared a slimy weasel is an insult to slimy weasels.\n\nhttps://t.co/qeLz5q5Uq7\u201d— Tea Pain (@Tea Pain) 1661262628
\u201c"I did nothing wrong as I told you in my new book that I'm here today to plug." \n\n https://t.co/1GTDXJAsWK\u201d— Mr. Ed (@Mr. Ed) 1661268760
\u201c@gregolear Love to see him squirm while testifying about KSA and Trump's stolen TS?SCI documents. He is complicit.\u201d— Greg Olear \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6 (@Greg Olear \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6) 1661265202
\u201c@jaredkushner do you even know what a "fact" is?\u201d— kingmandemo (@kingmandemo) 1661275015
\u201cIn this clip, Kushner insidiously suggests that the American public can\u2019t trust the media\u2019s portrayals of the Mar-a-Lago raid because those same news outlets were wrong about his attempt to secure Russian backchannels.\n\nSlight problem: those stories weren\u2019t disproven. Ever.\u201d— Zoomlag Defeater (@Zoomlag Defeater) 1661266845
\u201cAGAIN\u2026why would he have THREE HUNDRED Classified documents in a poorly secured storage room in a hotel????\n\nWhatever you do\u2026DEFLECT.\u201d— Terry Dresbach (@Terry Dresbach) 1661261658
\u201c\u201cI have no idea what\u2019s in there, but I guarantee you everything you have read is wrong.\u201d\n\nThat pretty much sums up the cult\u2019s logical approach to everything. \n#MAGAlogic\u201d— Jason F Knapp (@Jason F Knapp) 1661264755
\u201cSeriously?\nAnyone expecting Jared Kushner to give an honest answer to any question other than his name needs to have their head examined.\n\u2b07\ufe0f\u2b07\ufe0f\u2b07\ufe0f https://t.co/mkYDxSzKYz\u201d— eve (spelled with a lower case e) (@eve (spelled with a lower case e)) 1661283551
\u201cHow many documents have Jared's fingerprints ?\u201d— JL (@JL) 1661266947
\u201cJared Kushner made tens of millions off donald\u2019s presidency, secured financing for his failing 666 property by hustling God knows what, & got $2B from his best bud Saudi bone saw psychopath.\n\nWhy tf did he need to write a book?\nWhy the big promotion tour?\nWhat\u2019s this game about?\u201d— LB \ud83c\udf3b\u262e\ufe0f (@LB \ud83c\udf3b\u262e\ufe0f) 1661351654
The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) first alerted the Department of Justice (DoJ) to the missing White House documents.
The final outcome of the DoJ investigation of the NARA complaint and the FBI search is still unclear.
Whether that uncertainty played into Kushner's evasive answer or if he really doesn't know what his father-in-law was doing with all the documents at Mar-a-Lago, only Kushner knows.
