Matthew Karnitschnig, Politico Europe, 19 January 2017, under the headline “Germany’s last Atlanticist confronts Trump”: Heusgen had worked more than a decade as Merkel’s chief foreign policy and security adviser. “Just before Christmas,” the piece says, Merkel “dispatched Heusgen to Washington to meet with Trump’s camp.”
Politico reports a meeting at Trump transition headquarters with retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, then the president-elect’s choice for national security adviser, and Kathleen Troia McFarland, slated as deputy national security adviser. Heusgen, the article says, “laid out Germany’s view of the world on everything from Russia to Iran.” Politico calls him a “self-described Atlanticist” and “one of the last remaining top German officials with a deep understanding of the U.S.”
That is a reporter’s account. It is not a White House transcript. It is not a crime. Flynn later left the NSC; that later record is not assigned to Heusgen on this page. His own later account of a February 2017 Jared Kushner meeting is a separate post, in his words.