Jared Kushner, former President Donald Trump's son-in-law, balked at accusations made by his wife's cousin, Mary Trump, suggesting that he could be the "mole" that tipped off federal agents about the secret documents stored at Mar-a-Lago.
During a podcast appearance last week, Ms Trump was asked if she thought there was a mole in Mr Trump's inner circle, and if so, whom she believed it could be.
Ms Trump made several insinuations that Mr Kushner would have had enough access to know about the documents, and further suggested — all without hard evidence — that Mr Kushner could be handing his father-in-law to the feds on a silver platter to save his own skin down the road.
“We need to look very hard at why he [Kushner] has been so quiet for so many months now. And we need to think about who could also be implicated in this that would need as big a play as turning Donald in ... to get out of trouble — or at least to mitigate the trouble they’re in,” she said. “It sounds like somebody in Jared’s position.”
This is all speculation on Ms Trump's part. At the present moment, Mr Trump has not been charged with any crimes relating to his document mismanagement.
Mr Kushner appeared on former Fox News host Megyn Kelly's podcast where he discussed the allegations that he was secretly working for the feds.
“So first of all, it’s absolutely not true, categorically, in every way. But I think that’s more of a statement of the sad state of the media, where the more outlandish – especially if it includes me – then the media will write about and create headlines,” he said.
He later noted that Ms Trump never explicitly claimed he was a mole, but just that a he could be the mole — a convenient hedge for both of them — and suggested the media coverage was overblown.
“I don’t even think [Ms Trump] said she thought it was the case. She thought it could be the case. So I read the article and I thought, ‘This is the craziest thing I’ve ever seen.’ But for whatever reason, the media thought it was worth covering,” he said.
Ms Trump noted in her podcast interview that Mr Kushner's private equity firm received $2bn from the Saudi sovereign fund, despite Mr Kushner having little experience managing that kind of firm.
No evidence has been presented publicly linking Mr Kushner to any illicit Saudi dealings or suggesting he acted as a mole within the Trump family.
