On Twitter, Trump criticized the investigation into Russian meddling in last year’s US election and hit the attorney general for not investigating Clinton

This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

Donald Trump on Tuesday escalated his attacks on Jeff Sessions, questioning why the US attorney general was not investigating his former opponent Hillary Clinton, the latest turn in the president’s extraordinary feud with one of his top lieutenants.



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In a series of early-morning tweets issued on a day expected to feature a crucial Senate vote on healthcare reform, with a new Russia sanctions bill poised to soon reach his desk and before his son-in-law Jared Kushner’s appearance in front of the House intelligence committee, Trump focused his ire once more on Sessions and the investigation into Russian meddling in last year’s US election.

Trump has long expressed his frustration with the federal inquiry – led by the special counsel Robert Mueller – into potential collusion between his campaign and Moscow. In recent weeks, the president has reportedly sought to control or block it and sent strong signals that Sessions’ days are numbered.

The president, who said last week he would not have hired Sessions had he known the attorney general would recuse himself from overseeing the FBI’s Russia investigation, slammed his longtime ally for not investigating Clinton, his presidential rival in the 2016 election.



Play Video 0:52 Scaramucci: Trump ‘probably’ wants Sessions gone – video

“Attorney General Jeff Sessions has taken a VERY weak position on Hillary Clinton crimes (where are E-mails & DNC server) & Intel leakers!” Trump wrote, before accusing Andrew McCabe, the acting FBI director, of holding a bias against him.



“Problem is that the acting head of the FBI & the person in charge of the Hillary investigation, Andrew McCabe, got $700,000 from H for wife!”

McCabe’s wife, Jill McCabe, ran for the Virginia state senate in 2015, and lost. She received donations from sources connected to Virginia’s governor, Terry McAuliffe, a Clinton supporter, but not from Clinton directly.

In an earlier tweet, Trump wrote: “Ukrainian efforts to sabotage Trump campaign - ‘quietly working to boost Clinton’. So where is the investigation AG.”

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal later on Tuesday, Trump stopped short of saying he would fire his attorney general, but said: “I’m very disappointed in Jeff Sessions.”

And at a joint press conference with the Lebanese prime minister, Saad Hariri, Trump denied that he was allowing Sessions to “twist in the wind”.

He told reporters in the White House Rose Garden: “Well, I don’t think I am doing that but I am disappointed in the attorney general. He should not have recused himself almost immediately after he took office and, if he was going to recuse himself, he should have told me prior to taking office and I would have quite simply picked somebody else.”

The president again refused to say whether Sessions should remain in the job. “I want the attorney general to be much tougher on the leaks from intelligence agencies, which are leaking like rarely have they ever leaked before at a very important level,” he added.

“These are intelligence agencies: we cannot have that happen ... I told you before I’m very disappointed with the attorney general but we will see what happens. Time will tell. Time will tell.”

The president’s public assault on Sessions raised the possibility of Trump firing the attorney general, who has thus far weathered the criticism and expressed his intention to remain at the helm of the justice department.

Speaking to the conservative radio show host Hugh Hewitt on Tuesday, Anthony Scaramucci, the newly minted White House communications director, said Trump was “obviously frustrated” with Sessions.

Asked if Trump wanted Sessions out, Scaramucci said: “If there’s this level of tension in the relationship that’s public, you’re probably right.”

He added: “I said yesterday ... maybe the two of them could get together. My guess is the president doesn’t want to do that.”

The White House press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, echoed the president’s thinking on the Fox News morning talk show Fox & Friends, reiterating that Trump was “frustrated and disappointed” with Sessions for recusing himself from the Russia investigation.

“That frustration certainly hasn’t gone away,” she said. “And I don’t think it will.”

Sessions made the decision to recuse himself from the Russia investigation after it was revealed that he had twice met Sergey Kislyak, the Russian ambassador to the US, last year and did not disclose the meetings while testifying at his Senate confirmation hearing.

Trump’s comments on Tuesday followed a pattern that intensified earlier this month with harsh criticism of Sessions in an interview with the New York Times. On Monday, Trump referred to the attorney general in a tweet as “beleaguered”.

Reports have indicated that privately Trump has speculated to allies about the potential consequences of firing Sessions, who said last week he intended to stay in his post “as long as appropriate”.

The House speaker, Paul Ryan, the most senior Republican in Congress, deferred to the president when pressed repeatedly on Tuesday about the implications of Trump firing Sessions.

“The president gets to decide what his personnel is. He’s the executive branch. We’re the legislative branch,” Ryan told reporters at a news conference on Capitol Hill. “He determines who is hired and fired in the executive branch – that’s his prerogative. If he has any concerns or questions or problems with the attorney general, I’m sure he’ll bring it up with him himself.”

The South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham, one of Trump’s most vocal Republican critics, took a sharper tone, dubbing the president’s tweets “highly inappropriate”.

“Jeff understands that we are a nation of laws, not men,” Graham said in a statement on Tuesday. “On occasion, I’ve vigorously disagreed with Jeff but I’ve never once doubted his integrity or sense of fair play.”

Graham also voiced concern over Trump’s suggestion that Sessions investigate Clinton, who was cleared last year of any criminal wrongdoing in the investigation over her emails and since the election remains a private citizen.

“Prosecutorial decisions should be based on applying facts to the law without hint of political motivation,” Graham said. “To do otherwise is to run away from the longstanding American tradition of separating the law from politics regardless of party.”

Trump is reportedly weighing possible replacements for Sessions, with names such as the former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani and the Texas senator Ted Cruz being floated.

Cruz denied he was being considered for the role, saying in a statement on Monday he was “deeply gratified that we have a principled conservative like Jeff Sessions serving as attorney general”.

Giuliani, a longtime Trump surrogate, told CNN on Monday he did not want the job and would have recused himself from the Russia investigation had he been in Sessions’ position.

Sessions’ troubles are not limited to his increasingly tenuous hold over the position of attorney general.

On Friday, the Washington Post reported that Kislyak told superiors he discussed election-related issues with Sessions during the 2016 election. The Post cited anonymous US officials who described intelligence intercepts of Kislyak’s descriptions of his meetings with Sessions, directly undermining Sessions’ assertion under oath that he “did not have any communications with the Russians” or discuss matters pertaining to the campaign.

Responding to the report, Trump did not defend Sessions but did appear to confirm that the Post had seen a genuine piece of intelligence.

“A new INTELLIGENCE LEAK from the Amazon Washington Post, this time against AG Jeff Sessions,” Trump wrote on Saturday. “These illegal leaks, like [the former FBI director James] Comey’s, must stop!”

Jared Kushner's explanations on Russia reveal a man wholly unsuited to his job Read more

As the saga unfolded, Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser Kushner arrived at the Capitol for a private appearance before the House intelligence committee, his second meeting with investigators in two days. On Monday, Kushner was interviewed behind closed doors by the Senate intelligence committee. Both panels are overseeing parallel investigations into Russian interference in the 2016 election and the potential involvement of Trump’s associates.



In rare public remarks, Kushner insisted on Monday that he “did not collude” with Russia during the election and dismissed the significance of a meeting in which he participated that included Donald Trump Jr, the then Trump campaign manager, Paul Manafort, a Russian lawyer and a former Soviet spy.

In an 11-page statement released early on Monday, Kushner claimed he had had four contacts with Russian officials during the presidential election and transition but said they were part of his role as a Trump campaign point man for foreign governments.

On Tuesday morning, Donald Trump tweeted: “Jared Kushner did very well yesterday in proving he did not collude with the Russians. Witch Hunt. Next up, 11 year old Barron Trump!”

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