By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com
Former White House chief adviser Steve Bannon has lawyered up as he prepares to answer questions from officials investigating allegations of collusion between President Trump’s campaign and Russia.
Bannon, who suggested in an explosive new book that some of Trump’s top campaign aides may have violated serious laws, has retained Bill Burck, of the firm Quinn Emanuel, The Daily Beast reports.
Burck’s task is to help Bannon prepare for questions from the House intelligence committee as early as next week.
Burck also is representing former Chief of Staff Reince Priebus and White House Counsel Don McGahn as part of the Trump-Russia probe.
Bannon plans to fully cooperate with the investigation, sources told the Daily Beast.
In an interview with Michael Wolff, the author of the tell-all book, “Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House,” Bannon described some of Trump’s top campaign aides as naive, unethical and clumsy, seemingly unaware of the repercussions of meeting with a Russian attorney who pledged to provide documents that would “incriminate” Democratic rival Hillary Clinton.
Bannon said he was dumbfounded.
“The three senior guys in the campaign thought it was a good idea to meet with a foreign government inside Trump Tower in the conference room on the 25th floor – with no lawyers. They didn’t have any lawyers.
“Even if you thought that this was not treasonous, or unpatriotic, or bad shit, and I happen to think it’s all of that, you should have called the FBI immediately.”
Bannon even suggested Trump was aware of the Trump Tower meeting.
“The chance that Don Jr did not walk these jumos up to his father’s office on the twenty-sixth floor is zero.”
Bannon, who previously criticized the firing of then-FBI Director James Comey, said he doesn’t expect a conclusion to the special counsel investigation anytime soon. He added that the probe into alleged collision with the Kremlin will focus on money laundering, saying, “They’re going to crack Don Junior like an egg on national TV.”
Since Robert Mueller was appointed in May to lead the Russia-Trump investigation, four members of Trump’s inner circle have been indicted – and two have already pleaded guilty and plan to cooperate with the special counsel’s team.
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