Former Obama aide pushes back on reports Papadopoulos was ‘low level’

Tommy Vietor, who served as a spokesman for former President Obama’s National Security Council, on Saturday pushed back on the claim by President Trump’s aides and allies that George Papadopoulos was a “low-level” foreign policy staffer with little import to the Trump campaign.

“Low-level foreign policy staffers don’t set up head of state meetings. Trust me I was one,” Vietor wrote on Twitter. 

Low-level foreign policy staffers don’t set up head of state meetings. Trust me I was one. https://t.co/vfnyj60G5H

— Tommy Vietor (@TVietor08) December 30, 2017

{mosads}

Vietor’s tweet came in response to a New York Times report detailing, among other things, Papadopoulos’s role as a foreign policy adviser to Trump’s campaign.

In that role, he helped set up a meeting between the real estate mogul and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi just two months before the presidential election.

Papadopoulos pleaded guilty earlier this year to lying to the FBI about his contacts with people linked to the Russian government during the 2016 presidential race, and has since become a cooperating witness in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian meddling in the election.

Trump once lauded Papadopoulos as an “excellent guy.” But the White House and Trump’s allies have sought to downplay Papadopoulos’s role in the campaign since his guilty plea, calling him a low-level and insignificant aide whose time on Trump’s team was short.

According to the Times report, however, Papadopoulos appeared to play a significant role in the events that prompted the FBI to open a counterintelligence investigation into the Trump campaign before the 2016 election.