President Donald Trump insists in a new interview that even with the court actions on former Campaign Manager Paul Manafort and personal attorney Michael Cohen, there is still no proof of any collusion during the 2016 presidential campaign.
He took to Twitter early Thursday, hours before the prerecorded interview aired, to underscore his stand on collusion:
"NO COLLUSION - RIGGED WITCH HUNT!" Trump's tweet said.
In the interview also expressed frustration over his decision to hire Attorney General Jeff Sessions, telling Fox News' "Fox and Friends" co-host Ainsley Earhardt Thursday that he only hired the former Alabama senator out of a sense of loyalty, and complained that Sessions should not have recused himself from the Russia investigation.
"I wanted to stay uninvolved when everybody sees what's happened in the Justice Department," Trump said. "I put justice in quotes. Jeff Sessions recused himself which he shouldn't have done. Or he should have told me. Even my enemies say that Jeff Sessions should have told you that he was going to recuse himself and then you wouldn't have put him in."
However, he said, Sessions took the job and then said he would recuse himself, said Trump.
"I said, 'what kind of man is this,'" said Trump. "He was on the campaign. The only reason I gave him the job was because I felt loyalty. He was an original supporter. He was on the campaign. He knows there was no collusion."
And, for that matter, he added, "what's come out of Manafort? No collusion. What's come out of Michael Cohen? No collusion."
He also complained about the FBI raids on Cohen and Manafort.
"With Manafort, they raid his home at like 5 in the morning, I think, on a weekend," said Trump. His wife is in bed and they go in with guns? This isn't Al Capone."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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