President Donald Trump participated in a video teleconference with military officials on Christmas Eve from Mar-A-Lago, Florida and took a few questions from reporters afterward.
The president expressed sympathy toward former associates Roger Stone and Michael Flynn calling it “very unfair” treatment as they await sentencing in their cases — when asked whether he might consider pardons in connection with the Russia investigation that he calls a “witch hunt.”
“Am I going to pardon him? Well, I hadn’t thought of it,” President Trump told reporters. “I think it’s very tough what they did to Roger Stone compared to what they do to other people on their side.”
“You know Roger Stone was not involved in my campaign in any way, other than the very, very beginning before I think … long before I announced,” Trump said. “I’ve known Roger over the years, he’s a nice guy. A lot of people like him. And he got hit very hard as did General Flynn and a lot of other people. … And now, they’re finding out it was a big hoax. They’re finding out it was a horrible thing.”
The president was quick to remind reporters Tuesday that the Flynn and Stone cases spun out of the Russia investigation, which was recently revealed in a Justice Department Inspector General’s report to have had significant evidentiary errors and omissions related to the FBI’s Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant applications for former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page, reported Fox News.
President Trump then referred to the FBI officials involved in Russia probe as “dirty cops,” and expressed a strong desire to fight back against them. “And now we find out there were a bunch of dirty cops– paid for by the DNC, paid for by Hillary Clinton, in many cases. They did a phony dossier. They used the dossier for FISA. And now, as you know, the FISA court and the top judge is very much involved and hopefully they’re gonna do something about it,” the Commander in Chief said. (Continued Below)
“These were dirty people, these were bad people, these were evil people, and I hope that someday I’m going to consider it my greatest or one of my greatest achievements, getting rid of them. Because we have no place in our country for people like that,” the president continued.
House Democrats indicated in court filings Monday that they may still use information related to the Russia investigation to add new articles of impeachment if they can secure the testimony of former White House Counsel Don McGahn and the release of grand jury information from Mueller’s probe, as per Fox News.
In the meantime, House Democrats impeached President Trump and the articles have not been delivered to the Senate yet. The President slammed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and the Democrats for stalling and now claiming they want a “fair process”. (Continued Below)
Asked if he is concerned that Pelosi will hold up the articles indefinitely, the president responded, “All I know is my poll numbers are the highest they’ve ever been. Our fundraising in the Republican Party is the highest it’s ever been.”
“She hates the Republican Party. She hates all of the people that voted for me and the Republican Party. She got thrown out of Speaker once before– she lost like 63 seats– a tremendous record number of seats. I think it’s gonna happen again. She’s doing a tremendous disservice to the country. She’s not doing a good job and some people think she doesn’t know what she’s doing,” President Trump explained.
“The had no evidence at all. They had no crime. We had 196 or so Republicans voting 100%. We didn’t lose one Republican vote in the House. We had 3 Democrats come over to our side. … And we’re in a very good position. Ultimately that decision is going to be made by Mitch McConnell. He has the right to do whatever he wants, he’s the head of the Senate. People remember they treated us very unfairly. They didn’t give us due process. They didn’t give us a lawyer. They didn’t give us anything. Now they come to the Senate and they want everything,” he continued.
“You look back … at what they did. We weren’t entitled to witnesses, … lawyers, we sat in a basement. They would leak everything– they would leak it … selectively, with a sick corrupt politician named Schiff. He’s a corrupt politician. They treated us worse than anybody was ever treated, from a legal standpoint, in the history of the United States. It’s never happened before where you can’t have a lawyer, … a witness, … time. Even with the Constitutional lawyers, they got three lawyers, we got one. Fortunately, our one lawyer was better than their three,” the president said. (Video Below)
“So now, they get to the Senate. And now, we have the majority and it’s up to Mitch McConnell. And we have the majority and now they want McConnell to do wonderful things for them. He’s gonna do what he wants to do– very smart guy, … good guy, and a very fair guy,” Trump said.
“But [Democrats] treated us very unfairly and now they want fairness in the Senate. They ought to look back at the last year to see how they’ve hurt this country. Fortunately, we have a president who was able to plow through all the stuff that went on and goes on,” he added.
President Trump’s full phone call with the military; questions with the press on Roger Stone and Pelosi/Democrats begin at 25:15 mark into the video:
