For The Record

There he goes again. President Trump, stung by the guilty plea of former campaign aide George Papa­dopoulos to lying to FBI agents about conversations he had with a Russian operative who offered him “dirt” on Hillary Clinton during last year’s campaign, did his best to distance himself from the man he characterized as a “young, low-level volunteer named George, who has already proven to be a liar.”

But the President’s description of Mr. Papa­do­poulos, and White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ claim that his role in the campaign was “extremely limited,” didn’t square with Mr. Trump’s characterization of him in March 2016, at a time when the aide was exploring the possibility of brokering a meeting between the candidate and Vladimir Putin to coordinate strategy against Ms. Clinton.