Trump: Dem Criticism of Me 'Mostly False'

Trump tells Fox News Channel in an interview broadcast Thursday that "I guess I take it a little bit personally, but you can't let it get you down."

The billionaire real estate mogul was interviewed following a campaign appearance Wednesday evening in Scranton, Pennsylvania. At an earlier campaign appearance, he encouraged Russia to find and make public missing emails deleted by his presidential opponent, Hillary Clinton. This led to a fiery debate over hacking and his urging of a foreign government to meddle in American politics.

In the Fox interview he seemed to back away somewhat on saying he thought Russia was behind the hack of the Democratic National Committee emails, saying "who knows who it is." He called Russian President Vladimir Putin "a better leader" than President Barack Obama because "Obama is not a good leader. He's doing a better job than Obama."

Meanwhile, on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" Thursday, host Joe Scarborough called on Trump to "backtrack" on his comments, including about Putin being a better leader than President Barack Obama.

"Hey, I didn't like the Affordable Care Act either. But guess what, he [Obama] didn't shoot people at The Washington Post or the The New York Times," Scarborough said. "That statement in and of itself is to beyond the pale, it is disqualifying at this moment in time if you are a conservative Republican, if you are a liberal Democrat, if you are an American."

Material from The Associated Press was used in this report.