President Donald Trump was not saying Attorney General Jeff Sessions needs to leave through his tweet attacking him Tuesday morning, but instead, he was saying "exactly what his message says," which is Sessions should be investigating the Clintons, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said.
"You have the Clinton Foundation, you have the swap for the uranium with the Russians, you have millions of dollars coming out of a secret Canadian foundation that was funded by the Russians," Gingrich told Fox News' "Fox & Friends."
"[You have] Bill Clinton getting a half million-dollar speech in Moscow. I think what he's saying is why isn't there a parallel investigation?"
"The president has his own unique style," the former speaker continued. "It wouldn't be my style, but he has his own unique style. He has given Sessions a clear roadmap to survive, and it's a roadmap of balancing investigations, which would be legitimate, and I hope Sessions will understand and follow that."
If Sessions announced what happened along those lines, Gingrich said, then "you would see a little bit of relaxation" from Trump.
"I think he's lashing out because he thinks that the current system is so totally one-sided that somehow it has got to be fixed, and he's going to push very hard to reset what the story is," the former speaker said.
Trump, continued Gingrich, has been under attack from "the establishment" for six months, and he believes the left brought Trump's attacks on themselves, and have created "an environment in which it is now totally reasonable to go back and reopen the whole Clinton Foundation story."
The president also wants to ask "if we want to look at Russian influence, there was a lot more money going to the Clintons by any standard than anybody has even begun to allege in any way affected the Trump operation, particularly since nobody's found anything yet that affected the Trump operation," Gingrich continued.
Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani's name has come up as an attorney general who could take a better look at the Clinton Foundation, and Gingrich said what happens next will be up to Trump.
Gingrich said he would recommend against firing Sessions, as "loyalty has to be a two-way street, and the fact is Sessions was the first senator to support President Trump."
"He stayed with President Trump when he was 10 points behind and all the way through the various sports talk tapes and everything else," Gingrich said. "Sessions has been remarkably loyal to the president, and loyalty, I think, has to be a two-way street. But I do want to say, frankly, I'm equally frustrated with the Republicans in Congress."
Trump is also frustrated over Congress' actions, or lack of action, on Obamacare repeal, Gingrich said.
"He arrives as a businessman and looks at guys who for seven straight years said repeal," Gingrich said. "One person you cannot attack is Sen. Susan Collins. She voted against repeal, said it wasn't practical when it happened. She's the one person whose record allows her to say, 'I'm not doing this.'
"But everybody else, if you're Donald Trump and a business guy looking around going, what's wrong with this scene? You would want to hold up how many times someone said I'm for repeal and ask them so you're not going to vote 'yes' to go forward?"
Gingrich said he believes Congress next needs to spend August focused on economic growth, and on tax reforms.
"You better design a game plan on taxes that allows you to have a simple bill, easy to explain and understand that you get done by focusing on it, so you can have a boost in the first and second quarters," said Gingrich.
"If we are the party of jobs, prosperity, take-home pay, and economic growth, we will win 2018, pick up five or six Senate seats, and be in a much stronger position going into '19."