Donald Trump yesterday threatened to try to take a major American news network off the air in his latest salvo against unflattering coverage amid reports that he wanted to expand the US nuclear arsenal tenfold.

“With all of the Fake News coming out of NBC and the Networks, at what point is it appropriate to challenge their License? Bad for country,” he wrote in a Twitter post.

Hours later, he added: "Network news has become so partisan, distorted and fake that licenses must be challenged and, if appropriate, revoked. Not fair to public!"

It marks the latest threat the President has issued against a media house, and provoked immediate comparisons with President Richard Nixon and his attempts to punish the Washington Post for publishing damaging Watergate allegations during the 1970s.

At issue are a string of news stories that have suggested tensions within the Trump administration about the President’s fitness to govern.

Last week NBC News revealed that the US Secretary of State described the President as a “moron” and considered resigning over the summer.