VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA – FEBRUARY 28: Donald Trump Jr. delivers a speech during a ceremony for the official opening of the Trump International Tower and Hotel on February 28, 2017 in Vancouver, Canada.
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Last Updated Dec 8, 2017 1:11 PM EST
CBS News has confirmed that Donald Trump Jr. received an email in September 2016 offering access to hacked Democratic Party data. The emailed offer was dated Sept. 4 and was for a decryption key and website address providing access through WikiLeaks for hacked the documents. The new revelation was first reported by CNN.
A source who received the email in question tells CBS News there were about 20 people cc’d on the email. The sender thought he had obtained then-candidate Trump’s email. But the source says DJT@Trumporg.com was not a valid email for Mr. Trump.
The source who received the email also paraphrased the sender’s mail this way: “Don’t forget I’m the guy who got you this information….I should be considered for Ambassador to Japan.”
In a statement Alan Futerfas, Trump Jr.’s attorney said, “This is just the campaign receiving thousands of unsolicited emails on every possible topic.” Futerfas added that the unsolicited email came from “a guy simply alerting the campaign to the fact that there was a new WikiLeaks release.” The attorney insists that Trump Jr. never communicated with the person who sent the email, has no idea who he is and never responded to the email.
Trump Jr. began direct-messaging on Twitter with WikiLeaks on Sept. 20, the same month that he received the email offering access to hacked Democratic documents. The communications largely consisted of WikiLeaks offering information and advice to Trump Jr., and asking for things ranging from Donald Trump’s tax returns to a recommendation for an ambassadorship for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
The email sent to Trump Jr. arrived two months after the hacked Democratic National Committee emails were published, but before WikiLeaks began publishing Hillary Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta’s emails on October 7, less than an hour after the “Access Hollywood” tape with Donald Trump’s lewd comments about women surfaced. Podesta’s email had been hacked months earlier, in March 2016 when he inadvertently fell for a phishing scheme.
According to CNN, the email sent to Trump Jr. also offered access to data hacked from former Secretary of State Colin Powell. His stolen emails were published 10 days later.
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