"TRADE YOU MY SANCTIONS FOR YOUR DIRT":

He said he has no doubt that Russia interfered in the 2016 campaign (though he insists it was not with his help) and believes Trump's team was open to such assistance. He praised the special counsel, whom Trump has accused of running a "witch hunt," for investigating an issue with global stakes.

After more than nine hours with Mueller's team, Goldstone has also drawn some conclusions about what the special counsel is pursuing. Investigators were focused less on the details of the Trump Tower meeting that followed his email invitation to Trump Jr., he said.

Rather, prosecutors were keenly interested in his observations about the Trumps' relationship with Aras and Emin Agalarov, Russian father-and-son billionaires who financed Trump's Miss Universe pageant in Moscow in 2013 and then requested the 2016 sit-down at Trump Tower -- as well as the Agalarovs' relationship with the Kremlin, he said.

"They weren't as interested in the minutia," Goldstone said. "It was a bigger picture thing." [...]

Goldstone, a dual citizen of the United States and Britain who currently lives in New Jersey, said he thought Trump would win the presidency, but he added that he was never a political fan of the real estate developer. Independent Bernie Sanders was more his speed, he said, though he has never voted.

However, Goldstone had high hopes for his Russian client once Trump's candidacy took off: Perhaps Emin Agalarov would be invited to sing at the inauguration or visit the White House.

So he was peeved when Agalarov called on the morning of June 3, 2016, and asked him to use his pull with the Trump family for something else entirely.

Agalarov explained that his father had met that day with a "well connected" Russian lawyer, someone Agalarov said was either a current or former prosecutor. The lawyer had damaging information about Russian funding of the Democrats, Agalarov relayed. He asked Goldstone to get a meeting with "the Trumps" so the information could be passed along.

Goldstone said he was confused. What lawyer? What information? But Agalarov either didn't know or refused to answer, insisting Goldstone should just secure the meeting and not worry about such details, Goldstone recalled. (Balber, the Agalarov attorney, said the singer does not recall telling Goldstone the information had to do with Russian funding for Democrats.)

At the time, Goldstone said, it never occurred to him that the offer might be unethical or even illegal. "Hindsight is a beautiful thing," he said.

Sitting in his apartment in Hoboken, Goldstone dashed out an email to Trump Jr., whom he had met at a dinner in New York and with whom he occasionally corresponded.

He wrote that Aras Agalarov had met with "the Crown Prosecutor of Russia," a phrase he remembered from his time in England. He said that the prosecutor had provided information that "would incriminate Hillary" and was "very high level and sensitive," all of which he said struck him as reasonable assumptions based on what Agalarov told him.

The most provocative detail: Goldstone wrote that the information was "part of Russia and its government's support for Mr. Trump."

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