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Jeff Sessions
Sessions Wants NSC Staff to Take Lie Detector Tests
“Attorney General Jeff Sessions has told associates he wants to put the entire National Security Council staff through a lie detector test to root out leakers. It’s unclear whether this will ever happen, but Sessions floated the idea to multiple people, as recently as last month,” according to Jonathan Swan.
“Sessions’ idea is to do a one-time, one-issue, polygraph test of everyone on the NSC staff. Interrogators would sit down with every single NSC staffer (there’s more than 100 of them), and ask them, individually, what they know about the leaks of transcripts of the president’s phone calls with foreign leaders. Sessions suspects those leaks came from within the NSC, and thinks that a polygraph test — at the very least — would scare them out of leaking again.”
Sessions Told His Job Is Safe
“New White House chief of staff John Kelly, in one of his first acts in his new post, called Attorney General Jeff Sessions to reassure him that his position was safe despite the recent onslaught of criticism he has taken from President Trump,” the AP reports.
“Kelly called Sessions on Saturday to stress that the White House was supportive of his work and wanted him to continue his job.”
Sessions Says He Won’t Quit
Mike Allen: “Attorney General Jeff Sessions doesn’t plan to take the hint. President Trump continues hitting him in all body parts — apparently hoping he’ll resign, which could pave the way for firing special counsel Bob Mueller.”
“But Sessions allies tell us he won’t quit, and will have to be fired: This is his life’s work and dream job. (Yesterday, he took on sanctuary cities.) And in Trumptown, you can be down now, but back in favor after you endure a little humiliation. Ask Steve Bannon.”
Trump Won’t Say if He’ll Fire Sessions
President Trump “expressed his disappointment in Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Tuesday and questioned the importance of Mr. Sessions’s early endorsement of Mr. Trump’s candidacy, but the president declined to say whether he planned to fire him,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
Said Trump: “It’s not like a great loyal thing about the endorsement. I’m very disappointed in Jeff Sessions.”
When asked how long he would keep criticizing Session, he added: “I’m just looking at it. I’ll just see. It’s a very important thing.”
Sessions Is Growing ‘Pissed’ at Trump
Attorney General Jeff Sessions has no plans to leave office, as friends tell the Daily Beast that “he’s grown angry with President Donald Trump following a series of attacks meant to marginalize his power and, potentially, encourage his resignation.”
Said one ally: “Sessions is totally pissed off about it. It’s beyond insane. It’s cruel and it’s insane and it’s stupid.”
Scaramucci Confirms Trump Wants Sessions Gone
White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci told radio host Hugh Hewitt that “you’re probably right” President Trump wants to fire Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
Said Scaramucci: “I have an enormous amount of respect for the Attorney General, but I do know the president pretty well and if there’s this level of tension in the relationship that, that’s public, you’re probably right.”
Trump Keeps Blasting Sessions
President Trump continued to berate Attorney General Jeff Sessions in a series of tweets this morning, including this one:
Attorney General Jeff Sessions has taken a VERY weak position on Hillary Clinton crimes (where are E-mails & DNC server) & Intel leakers!
Trump Steps Up Talk of Firing Sessions
President Trump and his advisers “are privately discussing the possibility of replacing Attorney General Jeff Sessions, and some confidants are floating prospects who could take his place were he to resign or be fired, according to people familiar with the talks,” the Washington Post reports.
“Members of Trump’s circle, including White House officials, have increasingly raised the question among themselves in recent days as the president has continued to vent his frustration with the attorney general.”
Associated Press: “He has speculated aloud to allies in recent days about the potential consequences of firing Sessions, according to three people who have recently spoken to the president. They demanded anonymity to discuss private conversations.”
Trump Mulls Replacing Sessions with Giuliani
President Trump is so unhappy with Attorney General Jeff Sessions that he has raised the possibility of bringing back Rudolph Giuliani to replace him, Mike Allen reports.
“Giuliani would have a tough time getting 50 Republicans senators to vote to confirm him. He was such an early and ardent Trump backer that he wouldn’t be seen as an independent guardian of the department in these tumultuous times.”
“In fact, the nomination could be seen as Trump throwing gasoline on a fire. And Giuliani’s stop-and-frisk police policy as New York mayor, and clients since then, also would be controversial with many senators.”
Sessions Discussed Campaign with Russian Ambassador
“Russia’s ambassador to Washington told his superiors in Moscow that he discussed campaign-related matters, including policy issues important to Moscow, with Jeff Sessions during the 2016 presidential race, contrary to public assertions by the embattled attorney general,” the Washington Post reports.
“Ambassador Sergey Kislyak’s accounts of two conversations with Sessions — then a top foreign policy adviser to Republican candidate Donald Trump — were intercepted by U.S. spy agencies, which monitor the communications of senior Russian officials both in the United States and in Russia.”
“Sessions initially failed to disclose his contacts with Kislyak and then said that the meetings were not about the Trump campaign.”
Sessions Has Lawyered Up Too
National Law Journal: “Charles Cooper, the well-known Republican lawyer, wasn’t simply in attendance at U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ congressional hearing one week ago to support his friend. Cooper is Sessions’ personal lawyer.”
Trump Mostly Blames Sessions and Rosenstein
New York Times: “Inside the White House, those close to the president say he has continued to fume about the actions of Justice Department officials, his anger focused mostly on Mr. Rosenstein for appointing Mr. Mueller and on Attorney General Jeff Sessions, a longtime political ally whose decision to recuse himself from the Russia case in March enraged Mr. Trump…”
“While he has left open the possibility of dismissing Mr. Mueller and began considering it shortly after the special counsel was appointed last month, the president’s anger has been largely trained on Mr. Sessions and Mr. Rosenstein, whom he views less as executors of law than as salaried staff.”
Associated Press: “Trump advisers and confidants describe the president as increasingly angry over the investigation, yelling at television sets in the White House carrying coverage and insisting he is the target of a conspiracy to discredit — and potentially end — his presidency.”
Lobbyist for Russia Says He Attended Sessions Dinners
“An American lobbyist for Russian interests who helped craft an important foreign policy speech for Donald Trump has confirmed that he attended two dinners hosted by Jeff Sessions during the 2016 campaign, apparently contradicting the attorney general’s sworn testimony given this week,” The Guardian reports.
“Sessions testified under oath on Tuesday that he did not believe he had any contacts with lobbyists working for Russian interests over the course of Trump’s campaign. But Richard Burt, a former ambassador to Germany during the Reagan administration, who has represented Russian interests in Washington, told the Guardian that he could confirm previous media reports that stated he had contacts with Sessions at the time.”