President Donald Trump on Friday urged Attorney General Jeff Sessions to help find the author of the anonymous New York Times op-ed that depicted a “resistance” inside his administration, with staffers trying to thwart an impulsive president.
“I would say Jeff should be investigating who the author of that piece was because I really believe it’s national security,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One en route to North Dakota, according to a pool report.
The president has fumed publicly about the column since it was published on Wednesday, calling the writer “gutless” and declaring the anonymous essay amounted to “treason.”
White House officials are actively trying to determine the identity of the “senior administration official” who wrote the piece, who Trump said he believes is probably not someone “very high up.” A number of top Cabinet officials, Vice President Mike Pence and other high-level appointees have all denied being the author.
“It doesn’t seem to be anybody very high up because everybody very high up has already said, ‘It wasn’t me,’” Trump said on Friday. “It would be very hard if it was, if they got caught.”
Seizing on his characterization of the op-ed as a national security issue, Trump added: “We’re going to take a look at what he had, what he gave, what he’s talking about, also where he is right now.”
Such an investigation could include whether the author has a high-level security clearance, and Trump said he would look into barring this person from sensitive meetings.
A Justice Department spokeswoman said the department does not comment on investigations.
Trump also said he would consider taking action against The New York Times. “I’m looking at that right now. It only happened yesterday,” he said.
Former President Barack Obama weighed in on the situation Friday, saying in a speech that the notion that staffers are stealing papers from Trump’s desk and trying to secretly undermine the president is “not normal.”
“These people aren’t elected. They’re not accountable,” said Obama, during a speech at the University of Illinois Urbana–Champaign billed as the kickoff of his midterm campaigning. “They’re not doing us a service by actively promoting 90 percent of the crazy stuff that’s coming out of this White House, and then saying, ‘Don’t worry, we’re preventing the other 10 percent.’ That’s not how things are supposed to work.”
Coming on the heels of veteran journalist Bob Woodward’s soon-to-be-published book on the chaos in the administration, the op-ed has unleashed a new wave of paranoia and anxiety in the West Wing, which was still dealing with the aftermath of former aide Omarosa Manigault-Newman’s release of secret tapes she made during the 2016 campaign and as a White House staffer.
Trump has repeatedly encouraged Sessions to probe specific topics or political rivals. Last weekend, Trump questioned why the DOJ filed charges against two sitting GOP lawmakers and early Trump endorsers, Reps. Duncan Hunter of California and Chris Collins of New York, so late in the election cycle that the party could not replace them on the ballot before November.
Addressing one of the anecdotes from Woodward’s book on Friday, Trump cast doubt on the idea that former National Economic Council director Gary Cohn stole a draft letter off his desk that would have signaled America’s intent to withdraw from a trade deal with South Korea.
“He never took a memo off my desk. Gary Cohn, if he ever took a memo off my desk, I would have fired him in two seconds,” Trump said. “He would have been fired so fast.”
Trump also slammed the Times for publishing the op-ed, calling their decision a “disgrace” and repeating his past claims that America’s libel laws are too weak.
“Our libel laws should be toughened up so that if somebody writes things that are fraudulent and false, they get sued and they lose,” Trump said.
The Times said in a statement that the paper is confident the Justice Department “understands the First Amendment protects all Americans.”
“The president’s threats both underscore why we must safeguard the identity of the writer of this Op-Ed and serve as a reminder of the importance of a free and independent press to American democracy,” the statement said.
source: politico.com
everyone has a right for free and independent press in our democracy if they sign what they write, if hiding who they are it means they are lying, being deceitful. I am sure some democrat paid to have this article approved and sent to NYT, another scheme to get people to turn and vote differently. I believe AMERICANS are waking up seeing all the crimes democrats have been doing and covering up for years that they will turn against the democrats and vote Republicans, and when the Republicans win, I am sure the democrats will once again cause another witch hunt and not take responsibility for their own wrong doings…but who will they blame when they lose, Heaven to Betsy it won’t be themselves probably some computer hacker from tim buck two…..Be SMART VOTE REPUBLICANS
HOW IS THIS NOT TREATED AS A PHYSICAL THREAT TO THE PRESIDENT, HIS FAMILY, OUR GOVERNMENT?????……………….”one way or another”……exactly, what is this person threatening????
Secret Service, FBI, shouldn’t they PROTECT the President?? Drag NYTimes into custody, emergency charges, and hold in contempt for aiding and abetting a CRIMINAL who has managed to get his “sleeper cell” next to America’s President!…….IDENTIFY!!!! ENOUGH ALREADY!
And, why are we forced to belong to Facebook, Disquis, Twitter, etc. in order to Post & have our VOICES HEARD???? Leave it with email
Jeff Session’s is WORTHLESS!!! He needs to go and maybe be a Southern Preacher
There is not any proof that this person even exists anywhere but in the imagination of someone at the NYT. If this person does happen to exist, the accused has a right to confront the accuser.
In the process of draining the swamp! I agree with our President! The person or persons shold be caught. I also think perhaps a reward of say $100,000 would help it along!!!!
Only a bare face liar would say such thing! We need to put this ALL behind us and move on!
What a joke! Obama has the gall to say anything about the current President! After all the espionage, deceit , lies and criminal activities that are coming that wentt on under his presidency. Which was bought by his cronies like George Soros , (in my opinion).He was not elected by the people like our current president. Who care what he has to say! Crying 1st amendment, protect the anonymous blah, blah, blah.. That’s. all NYT’s can come up with! FAKE NEWS! May the truth come out and may you pursue consequences for their actions!
The Offender should be hunted down and publicly receive the harshest of punishments. They knew exactly what they were doing and tried to mask it under the veil of a fake ‘resistance’. Those who are undermining Making America Great Again – are an ENEMY of America – and need to be dealt with as such. It is time for Criminal Democrats, BLM, and Antifa to be drawn down – forcefully – if necessary.
obama is so full of crap its not funny. if things are being stolen from the white house i bet he has something to do with it. since he is the one said “that not all are following what they are being told” that tell me he is behind it. his so called things with the prices of the insurance rates raising is so rotten that us poor ppl who are on social security couldnt afford it. went from $122.00 to 304.00 that is no way in hell that i could afford it but that was one thing he did for seniors besides around 4 times not getting any raises. but congress sure did. not fair when congress can take the money out of the social security but never paid it back but they sure did get there money. too b
ad we dont take there money untill its all payed back every dollar plus 29.99% interest
He probably should not look to hard because there probably isn’t one. It is very likely someone at the NYT invented the whole thing as a ploy to distract President Trump and having looking in his closets for phantom moles. And perhaps to mislead the American public. The NYT is not to be trusted.
He has every right to fume! Who does this! If this were BO, the Deep State would be up in arms investigating night and day as well as the Marxist Media. I am sick of the double standard, especially when we finally have a leader not a career politician who cares more about lining his/her pockets than he does about the American people!
The free and independent press does not include stealing private documents and printing unverified information and presenting such garbage as truth. The NYT has no pride left and POTUS description of the Times as fake news is justly verified. Who would even buy such a rag?
I think this is terrible, but in the back of my mind, are they just wanting to create havoc and put something out there to take us away from things that are important. Not that finding this coward is not important, but it does take time away from important things that need doing.