NEW YORK — Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign said its communications with a firm that did opposition research into then-candidate Donald Trump’s Russia ties should be kept out of a related criminal case.
The campaign and research firm Fusion GPS said in Tuesday court filings that their 2016 messages are protected by attorney-client privilege. Fusion said the privilege applies because it had been hired by the Democratic National Committee’s law firm — Perkins Coie LLP — to help prepare a defense in case Trump sued them for defamation over their Russia claims.
The filings by the campaign and Perkins Coie seek to intervene in the criminal case against DNC-linked lawyer Michael Sussmann, who is accused of lying to the FBI before it opened the Trump-Russia-probe.
