Simona Mangiante Papadopoulos, who is married to former Trump campaign foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos, said that Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee were “very professional” and “receptive” to her testimony before them on Wednesday, according to a new report.
Papadopoulos said it was “completely beyond my knowledge” whether the Trump campaign pushed her husband to preserve Russian contacts, according to Politico.
She also was unsure if her husband thinks Russia sought to use him to communicate with the campaign, but claimed that his actions were lawful.
“Everything he tried to do was completely lawful and legal,” she said.
George Papadopoulos pleaded guilty last year to misleading FBI agents concerning his contacts with Russians. He said in his guilty plea he would comply with special counsel Robert Mueller’s team and “provide information regarding any and all matters as to which the government deems relevant.”
Simona Papadopoulos said it was a “brave choice” from her husband to comply with the Mueller probe and signaled he is open to testifying in front of Congress at some point.
In May, it was reported that George Papadopoulos was in contact with an FBI informant, Stefan A. Halper, who also communicated with others on Trump’s campaign team.
Mueller is investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election and whether the Trump campaign colluded with the Kremlin during the campaign.
[Related: Robert Mueller indicts 12 Russian officers for election meddling, hacking into Clinton’s emails]
President Trump has called the probe a “witch hunt” and maintained that his campaign never colluded with the Russians.
