President Donald Trump took off on Friday afternoon, embarking on his first foreign trip as president — and almost as soon as he was wheels up to Saudi Arabia the bombshells started going off.
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The New York Times reported that Trump boasted to Russian officials that in firing FBI Director James Comey he had dispatched a “nut job” and that his ouster took “great pressure” off of him. The Washington Post, meanwhile, reported that the federal investigation into possible collusion between Trump’s presidential campaign and Russia includes a current White House official as a “significant person of interest.”
“The two stories come after a week of damning revelations about the Trump White House, which is now engulfed in scandal and facing a special prosecutor,” POLITICO’s Matthew Nussbaum reports. “Trump admitted last week that he fired Comey in part because of the Russia investigation, blowing up the White House message that the firing was based on a Department of Justice recommendation.”
Meanwhile, President Trump has expressed regret about firing former national security adviser Michael Flynn, POLITICO’s Josh Dawsey reports. “Trump has grown obsessed with defending the tough-talking 58-year old general, repeatedly telling aides and associates in private that Flynn was a “good man.” One adviser close to Trump said he's heard Trump defend the general using the exact words described in reports of memos written by former FBI director James Comey recording his conversations with the president — and that Trump has told people inside the White House he wished the investigation would go away.”