President Donald Trump sought to play down an explosive opinion piece published in the New York Times this week, saying it appeared to be written by a "fairly low-level" individual.

Speaking to Fox, in an interview published Friday, he said that the White House was running like a well-oiled machine and criticized the anonymity of the NYT piece.

"So they take one person out of thousands," Trump said, before adding: "But what's unfair, I don't mind when they write a book and they make lies because it gets discredited."

"I'll tell you, when somebody writes and you can't discredit because you have no idea who they are ... it is a very unfair thing," he said.