President Donald Trump has blamed his senior adviser Jared Kushner for some of the decisions that led to the appointment of Robert Mueller as special counsel, Vanity Fair reported on Wednesday.

Trump complained about Kushner in conversations with his former chief strategist, Steve Bannon, and his longtime adviser Roger Stone.



President Donald Trump is becoming frustrated with Jared Kushner, a senior White House adviser who is also his son-in-law, Vanity Fair reported on Wednesday.

Citing a source briefed on a Tuesday call between Trump and the former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, Vanity Fair's Gabriel Sherman reported that Trump blamed Kushner "for his role in decisions, specifically the firings" of Michael Flynn as White House national security adviser and James Comey as FBI director.

Comey's firing in May ultimately led the deputy attorney general to appoint Robert Mueller, the special counsel who this week announced the first charges in his investigation into Russia's meddling in the 2016 US election.

Trump also told his longtime adviser Roger Stone that he agreed with Stone's assessment that Kushner was providing him bad political advice, someone familiar with the conversation told Vanity Fair.

"Jared is the worst political adviser in the White House in modern history," Sam Nunberg, a former Trump campaign operative, told Vanity Fair. "I'm only saying publicly what everyone says behind the scenes at Fox News, in conservative media, and the Senate and Congress."

Kushner's role in the administration and campaign has come under intense scrutiny since he joined the White House earlier this year.

Kushner was at a Trump Tower meeting in June 2016 among Trump's son Donald Trump Jr.; the Trump campaign chairman, Paul Manafort; and a Russian lawyer. Emails released earlier this year showed that Trump Jr. had been promised dirt on the soon-to-be Democratic presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton. It is unclear whether that material was provided; Trump Jr. has denied that it was.

Manafort on Monday was indicted by a grand jury on 12 counts resulting from Mueller's investigation.

Kushner has also had to resubmit his security-clearance form on multiple occasions after failing to disclose foreign contacts, and he has come under fire recently for using a private email account to discuss some government business while in his position at the White House.