Papadopoulos lied to FBI out of loyalty to Trump: report

George Papadopoulos reportedly lied to FBI agents out of loyalty to President Trump, according to ABC News, citing a source “with direct knowledge” of the special council’s Russia investigation.

Papadopoulos, a former foreign policy aide on the Trump campaign, pleaded guilty last month to lying to FBI agents about his contacts with Russian nationals during the campaign. According to the court documents, Papadopoulos offered to set up a meeting between Trump and Vladimir Putin during the campaign.

The charges and guilty plea were unsealed last month as part of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russia’s meddling in the 2016 presidential election, including any possible ties between the Trump campaign and Moscow.

{mosads}The source told ABC that Papadopoulos lied to the FBI because he did not want to contradict the president’s denouncement of claims that his campaign had contact with Russian officials.

Since the revelations about Papadopoulos’s admission surfaced, Trump and other officials have tried to distance themselves from the former aide, calling him a low-level “volunteer” and “the coffee boy.”

But more information about Papadopoulos’s role in the campaign shows that he often represented the campaign in meetings with foreign officials and in other public engagements.