WASHINGTON -- The Senate Intelligence Committee, seeking to accelerate its investigation into Russian meddling in the presidential election, has asked several high-profile Trump campaign associates to hand over emails and other records of communications and dealings with Russian officials and businesspeople.
The requests, made in letters sent by the committee in the past 10 days, are a preliminary step and open the way to subpoenas for anyone who does not comply, said two officials with knowledge of the Senate investigation. They said Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., chairman of the committee, was prepared to compel the Trump associates to turn over their records.
Among those who said they had received the requests were Roger Stone, an informal adviser to President Donald Trump, and Carter Page, a businessman and former foreign policy adviser to the Trump campaign. Paul Manafort, former campaign chairman, and Michael Flynn, former national security adviser, also were sent letters, said the officials with knowledge of the investigation.
Stone said he planned to comply with the request and noted that he has said in the past that he will testify voluntarily.
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"I am eager, indeed anxious, to testify in full public session, have requested no immunity and am ready to go," he said in a brief interview.
Stone said he has had no communications with Russian officials other than previously disclosed communications with Guccifer 2.0, the online persona that officials believe was actually Russian intelligence officers.
Page was more circumspect. In an email, he said, "Although I will help in any way that I can, please note that any records I may have saved as a private citizen with limited technology capabilities will be minuscule in comparison to the full database of information which has already been collected under last year's completely unjustified FISA warrant."
He was referring to a warrant issued by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court allowing the Justice Department to secretly wiretap his communications. The warrant was issued after investigators concluded that Page was no longer part of the Trump campaign and was based on evidence that he was operating as a Russian agent, officials have said.
Page, Stone and Manafort are all under scrutiny in an FBI investigation into Russian election meddling and allegations of collusion by Trump associates. There are two other separate, congressional investigations -- one by the Senate panel and the other by the House Intelligence Committee.
Separately Friday, current and former U.S. officials said Flynn, who was forced to resign after 24 days on the job because of revelations about his discussions with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, was warned by senior members of Trump's transition team about the risks of his contacts with Kislyak.
Flynn was told in a late November meeting that Kislyak's conversations were almost certainly being monitored by U.S. intelligence agencies, officials said, a caution that came a month before Flynn was recorded discussing U.S. sanctions against Russia with Kislyak, suggesting that the Trump administration would re-evaluate the issue.
Officials were so concerned that Flynn did not fully understand the motives of the Russian ambassador that the head of Trump's national security council transition team asked Obama administration officials for a classified CIA profile of Kislyak, officials said. The document was delivered within days, officials said, but it is not clear that Flynn ever read it.
The previously undisclosed sequence reveals the extent to which even some Trump insiders were troubled by the still-forming administration's entanglements with Russia and its enthusiasm for a friendly relationship with the Kremlin.
Information for this article was contributed by Matthew Rosenberg and Maggie Haberman of The New York Times and by Greg Miller and Adam Entous of The Washington Post.
A Section on 05/06/2017