Roger Stone: Nunberg ‘not speaking at my behest or direction’

Longtime Republican operative and informal Trump adviser Roger Stone on Tuesday denied telling ex-Trump campaign aide Sam Nunberg to defy a subpoena from special counsel Robert Mueller’s team.

“Sam Nunberg marches to his own drummer. He’s not speaking at my behest or direction. He is clearly not shy about expressing his own views,” Stone wrote in a Facebook post. 

“I was briefly part of the Trump campaign and have been the President’s friend and adviser for decades; and would expect that Mueller’s team would at some point ask for any documents or emails sent or written by me,” he continued. 

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In a series of bizarre cable interviews on Monday, Nunberg vacillated between voicing support for Trump’s view that the special counsel probe is a “witch hunt” while also criticizing the president and his top aides. Nunberg vowed he would not comply with a subpoena he’d received from Mueller’s team demanding his correspondences with Trump and nine other associates.

In explaining his logic for defying the subpoena, Nunberg often invoked Stone’s name, saying it would take “80 hours” to go through all the emails he exchanged with Stone and former Trump campaign executive Stephen Bannon. Some had drawn parallels between Nunberg’s antics Monday and those of Stone, a close ally.

Nunberg told MSNBC’s Katy Tur that he decided not to comply with the order a couple hours before going on the air, and that he was not directed by the Trump administration. He later told The Associated Press that he would ultimately cooperate with Mueller’s team.

The ex-campaign aide, who has in the past admitted to planting a false story in the press, also said he thinks Mueller’s team “may” have information proving Trump did something illegal during the election.

Stone continued to assert Tuesday that he has had no knowledge or involvement in collusion with the Russians, adding that he had no advance knowledge of WikiLeaks releasing hacked communications from Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s campaign.

Stone has faced questions in the Russia probe from the House Intelligence Committee, who asked about his communications with WikiLeaks and its founder Julian Assange. 

In his testimony, Stone insisted that he never communicated directly with Assange and instead spoke through an intermediary.