Story highlights Instead of celebrating a victory lap after his trip, Trump returns to a raging controversy over Russia, writes Gloria Borger

Borger: Trump appears angry, lonely and unhappy with those around him

(CNN) It's not that President Trump was excited about his first foreign trip. He complained to friends beforehand it was going to be too long; he just wasn't looking forward to it. Besides, he was "in a pretty glum mood" when he left, according to one source who speaks with the President.

His homecoming, it appears, did nothing to cheer him up.

Instead of celebrating a victory lap after touring the Middle East and meeting with the Pope and European leaders, Trump returned to the continuing controversy over Russia. He was preoccupied with legal issues and staff problems as the controversy placed his son-in-law, and senior adviser, Jared Kushner, as part of a counterintelligence investigation. Sessions with lawyers are nothing new for this litigious ex-businessman; but with infinitely higher stakes, this was different.

One source says Trump has complained privately about his White House counsel Don McGahn, well known as a specialist in campaign finance law. But his inside counsel has nothing to do with his personal defense, anyway -- and so he was expected to meet with his go-to attorney, Marc Kasowitz. His longtime lawyer, two sources say, is going to become what one called the "supervisor" of Trump's outside legal team. He'll be the Trump whisperer, adds another, "not the guy interacting with [special counsel Robert] Mueller."

"Allowing a special counsel to happen was idiocy," says one ally, who may be channeling the President's thinking. "Special counsels never end well." Never mind that Trump's own firing of FBI Director James Comey -- and his repeated attempts to get administration appointees to end the matter -- began the chain of events that led to the Mueller appointment. If anyone wanted to stop the President, it didn't happen. Maybe they agreed with Trump that the Democrats would support the move?

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