President Donald Trump said Monday that “nobody disobeys my orders,” after special counsel Robert Mueller’s report detailed numerous examples of aides refusing to follow his commands.
CNN’s Kaitlan Collins asked Trump if he was concerned that members of his staff may ignore his orders after the Mueller report was made public last week. Trump has derided the Mueller report as “crazy” while also claiming it totally exonerates him of any crime.
“Nobody disobeys my orders,” Trump responded while walking on the South Lawn during the White House’s annual Easter egg roll.
The report states that "The President's efforts to influence the investigation were mostly unsuccessful, but that is largely because the persons who surrounded the President declined to carry out orders or accede to his requests.”
An unnamed senior administration official told CNN after the report’s release: "that the President makes absurd demands of his staff and administration officials -- who are alarmed by them and reluctant to follow them -- is not only unsurprising but has become the norm.”
In September of last year, an anonymous senior official in the Trump administration published an op-ed in The New York Times claiming to be a part of a “quiet resistance” made up of officials “working diligently from within to frustrate parts of his [Trump’s] agenda and his worst inclinations.”