Senate working group will attend future talks with North Korea, Idaho senator says

The White House and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have agreed that representatives from a Senate working group will attend any future negotiations with North Korea that come out of the summit, Sen. Jim Risch said Monday.

Posted 10:40 p.m. Jun 11, 2018 — Updated 10:40 p.m. Jun 11, 2018

Dana Bash

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Sophie Tatum (CNN)

WASHINGTON (CNN) — The White House and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have agreed that representatives from a Senate working group will attend any future negotiations with North Korea that come out of the summit, Sen. Jim Risch said Monday.

President Donald Trump is in Singapore for a highly-anticipated meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

Risch, an Idaho Republican, told reporters on Monday that the representatives from the working group would act as observers in order to get the Senate involved on the front end of any potential treaty that they would be asked to approve.

Leading the working group as chair and co-chair are Risch and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-California.

Risch also said he is not worried about the first meeting that is set to take place Monday night ET with just the two leaders, adding that he is comfortable because the second meeting is supposed to include advisers.

If the second meeting doesn't occur, it's an indication the first meeting didn't go well, Risch said.

Trump is scheduled to meet with his North Korean counterpart at 9 a.m. local time, which is 9 p.m. ET, and they will be joined only by translators.

Later, advisers are supposed to take part in a larger meeting. In the larger session, Trump is supposed to be joined by Pompeo, White House chief of staff John Kelly, national security adviser John Bolton and US Ambassador to the Philippines Sung Kim, who has lent his Korea expertise to the talks, according to the White House.

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