Roger Stone Continues to Deny Ever Doing Anything Wrong
Here are things Roger Stone denied in his interview with George Stephanopoulos on This Week on Sunday:
- That he ever communicated with Julian Assange, despite multiple emails and video of public remarks by Stone himself that claim otherwise
- That he knew anything about Hillary Clinton campaign chair John Podesta’s emails leaking before it happened
- That there was any collusion between the Donald Trump campaign and Russia
- That he has had any contact with the Robert Mueller investigation
The interview begins with Stephanapoulos lining up emails where Stone claims he was a conduit between Wikileaks and Trump campaign. But Stone says, right in the beginning of the interview, that entire premise is incorrect.
Stephanapoulos showed Stone an email between Jerome Corsi and Roger Stone with the subject line, “Get to Assange,” which seems like pretty damning evidence, as well as other emails between the two about the Wikileaks founder. Stone even emailed Sam Nunberg to say he ate dinner with his “new pal,” Assange, the night before. And, finally, a clip of Stone speaking and saying, “I actually have communicated with Assange.” But, apparently, those were all lies.
Stone responded to the evidence with a rambling word salad, which included the requisite swipes at the New York Times and Washington Post, before ultimately telling Stephanapoulos, “No, I had no contact with Assange. Assange himself has said ‘Roger Stone is a brilliant spin master, we have had no communication with him whatsoever.’”
Stone continued, denying he knew about Podesta’s emails leaking before they went public. Quoting an email exchange “And there’s no reference in that email to John Podesta’s emails either. It simply says Podesta will be exposed to the American people, whatever that means.”
A document from the Mueller investigation, though, claims Jerome Corsi emailed Stone about the Podesta leak 10 weeks before it happened. And, Stone also tweeted on August 21 that “it will soon [be] the Podesta’s time in the barrel.”
It’s a perplexing move for Stone, going on national television while he is under scrutiny by Mueller. On the other hand, Stone has never been one to shy away from a camera.