In a wide-ranging, exclusive interview with The Post, President Trump said Wednesday that if House Democrats launched probes into his administration — which he called “presidential harassment” — they’d pay a heavy price.
“If they go down the presidential harassment track, if they want go and harass the president and the administration, I think that would be the best thing that would happen to me. I’m a counter-puncher and I will hit them so hard they’d never been hit like that,” he said during a 36-minute Oval Office sitdown.
The commander-in-chief said he could declassify FISA warrant applications and other documents from Robert Mueller’s probe — and predicted the disclosure would expose the FBI, the Justice Department and the Clinton campaign as being in cahoots to set him up.
“I think that would help my campaign. If they want to play tough, I will do it. They will see how devastating those pages are.”
But Trump told The Post he wanted to save the documents until they were needed.
“It’s much more powerful if I do it then,” Trump said, “because if we had done it already, it would already be yesterday’s news.”
Trump revealed his playbook just as Democrats are set to take over House committeesin January where they are poised to investigate his potential business conflicts of interests, tax returns, Russia dealings and more.
With the GOP losing power in January, its congressional investigations into alleged Department of Justice misconduct in launching the Russia probe is expected to fizzle out.
In September, a group of Trump allies in the House – led by Rep. Lee Zeldin of New York – called on Trump to declassify scores of Justice Department documents they believe undercut the start of the Russia investigation and show bias against Trump.
The documents include Justice officials’ request to surveil Trump campaign adviser Carter Page and memos on DOJ official Bruce Ohr’s interactions with Christopher Steele, the author of a controversial dossier that alleged Trump ties with Russia.
Trump initially agreed to declassify the documents, including text messages sent by former FBI officials James Comey, Andrew G. McCabe as well as Peter Strzok, Lisa Page and Ohr. Trump allies believe the revelations will show favoritism toward Hillary Clinton and a plot to take down Trump.
Trump then reversed course, citing the need for further review and concern of US allies.
Trump added Wednesday that his lawyer Emmet Flood thought it would be better politically to wait.
“He didn’t want me to do it yet, because I can save it,” Trump said.
The president also pushed back on the notion that all the Justice Department documents should eventually be released for the sake of transparency.
“Some things maybe the public shouldn’t see because they are so bad,” Trump said, making clear it wasn’t damaging to him, but to others. “Maybe it’s better that the public not see what’s been going on with this country.”
DOJ attorney George Toscas will be deposed Thursday as part of a congressional investigation into possible FISA abuse.
Staffers with the House Judiciary and House Oversight Committees will quiz Toscas about DOJ official Bruce Ohr.
Ohr will be interviewed on Aug. 28.
House Republicans will resume an investigation of the FBI and DOJ’s handling of the Russia investigation on Thursday with a deposition of George Z. Toscas, a national security attorney at the Department of Justice.
Toscas, who handles counterterrorism and counterespionage cases, will appear for a deposition at 10 a.m. before staffers with the House Judiciary and House Government & Oversight Committees, a source familiar with the matter tells The Daily Caller News Foundation.
Toscas was one of 17 current and former FBI and Justice Department officials included on a list submitted to the two House committees by California Rep. Devin Nunes, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.
Nunes suggested interviewing Toscas and the other officials regarding an investigation into the FBI and Justice Department’s possible abuse of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).
Congressional Republicans have probed whether the agencies misled federal surveillance judges by relying on the unverified Steele dossier to obtain FISA warrants against former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.
Toscas is mentioned throughout text messages exchanged between former FBI counterintelligence official Peter Strzok and former FBI attorney Lisa Page. Strzok and Page, neither of which work for the FBI (Strzok was fired on Aug. 10), mentioned Toscas most often during the FBI’s Hillary Clinton email investigation.
The Washington Post has reported that Toscas was the Justice Department official who reminded then-FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe about Clinton emails found on Anthony Weiner’s laptop. McCabe had been informed about the emails weeks earlier but failed to take action on them until late-October 2016.
Strzok and Page, who have already been interviewed by the House panels, also mention Toscas in text messages sent at key points in the FBI’s investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential campaign.
Strzok sent one message to Page on July 30, 2016, the day before the FBI opened the Russia probe, that appears to reference Toscas and then-FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe.
“Do you know if Andy got concurrence back from George about the preamble? No need to ask Andy right now, I think we can in very good faith date the [letterhead memorandum] July 2016,” Strzok wrote.
TheDCNF’s source says that Republicans will ask Toscas about the origins of the government’s Russia probe as well as about Bruce Ohr, the Justice Department official who served as a back channel between the FBI and Christopher Steele, the former British spy who wrote the dossier.
Ohr was also in contact with Glenn Simpson, the founder of Fusion GPS, the opposition research firm that hired Steele as part of an anti-Trump project financed by the Clinton campaign and DNC.
Ohr’s wife, a Russia expert named Nellie Ohr, worked for Fusion GPS on the Trump project.
Ohr, who was demoted in December from his position as assistant deputy attorney general, will be interviewed by the two House committees on Aug. 28.
Republicans want to know who at the Justice Department, if anyone, directed Ohr to maintain contact with Steele. The relationship has raised questions because the FBI cut ties with Steele on Nov. 1, 2016 because of the former spy’s unauthorized contacts with the media.
Lawmakers have also questioned why Ohr was meeting with Steele despite claims from top DOJ officials that he was not on the team leading the Russia investigation.
“To my knowledge he wasn’t working on the Russian matter,” Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein testified on June 28.
Ohr was interviewed a dozen times by the FBI after the election about his interactions with Steele. Text messages and emails recently provided to Congress also show that Ohr and Steele were in contact throughout 2016 and 2017.
Former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director John Brennan called President Donald Trump’s decision Wednesday to revoke his security clearance an “attempt to suppress freedom of speech” and to “punish critics.”
John O. Brennan
✔@JohnBrennan
This action is part of a broader effort by Mr. Trump to suppress freedom of speech & punish critics. It should gravely worry all Americans, including intelligence professionals, about the cost of speaking out. My principles are worth far more than clearances. I will not relent.
NBC News
✔@NBCNews
BREAKING: President Trump is revoking former CIA Director and high-profile Trump critic John Brennan’s security clearance, White House says. https://nbcnews.to/2w9hobN
Brennan was a controversial figure during the Obama administration
White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders read a statement earlier Wednesday from the president that explained his decision, citing his constitutional authority and duty to protect the nation’s secrets:
Mr. Brennan has a history that calls in to question his objectivity and credibility. In 2014, for example, he denied to Congress that CIA officials under his supervision had improperly accessed the computer files of congressional staffers. He told the Council on Foreign Relations that the CIA would never do such a thing. The CIA’s Inspector General however contradicted Mr. Brennan directly, concluding unequivocally that agency officials had indeed improperly accessed congressional staffers files. More recently, Mr. Brennan told Congress that the intelligence community did not make use of the so-called Steele dossier in an assessment regarding the 2016 election, an assertion contradicted by at least two other senior officials in the intelligence community, and all of the facts.
Additionally, Mr. Brennan has recently leveraged his status as a former high ranking official with access to highly sensitive information to make a series of unfounded and outrageous allegations, wild outbursts on the internet and television about this administration. Mr. Brennan’s lying and recent conduct, characterized by increasingly frenzied commentary is wholly inconsistent with access to the nation’s most closely held secrets and facilities, the very aim of our adversaries which is to sow division and chaos.
The president also said that the clearances of several other former Obama administration officials — “James Clapper, James Comey, Michael Hayden, Sally Yates, Susan Rice, Andrew McCabe, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, and Bruce Ohr” — was also under review. Yates was briefly acting Attorney General under Trump before she was fired for refusing to enforce the travel ban, a revised version of which was later upheld by the Supreme Court. Ohr still works at the Department of Justice.
Brennan, who describes himself in his Twitter profile as “Nonpartisan American who is very concerned about our collective future,” has emerged as a vociferous, even alarmist, critic of President Trump. Last month, he accused the president of treason for his press conference with Russian president Vladimir Putin, and hinted that Republicans should help impeach him.
John O. Brennan
✔@JohnBrennan
Donald Trump’s press conference performance in Helsinki rises to & exceeds the threshold of “high crimes & misdemeanors.” It was nothing short of treasonous. Not only were Trump’s comments imbecilic, he is wholly in the pocket of Putin. Republican Patriots: Where are you???
The left has argued in recent weeks that conservatives who are banned from social media platforms or targeted by boycotts do not have a “free speech” argument — yet that is the same argument Brennan invokes in defense of his former privilege to access the nation’s secrets.
CNN analyst and former CIA intelligence official Philip Mudd wondered aloud Monday when a shadow government will emerge to oppose President Donald Trump following a joint press conference with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, Finland.
CNN analyst Philip Mudd chillingly raises prospect of a "shadow government," taking on President Trump following summit with Putin. pic.twitter.com/toEs9VDsve
COOPER: Senator McCain is saying [the joint Trump-Putin press conference] was the most disgraceful display essentially by an American president on the world stage. Phil do you agree with that?
MUDD: I do, but you have to step back even a short time after this and say, what next? You’ve seen senators come out. In the past, you’ve seen a senator in the midst of a painful illness, Senator McCain, Senators like Jeff Flake who are leaving the Senate. Now you see Marco Rubio still obviously in the fight speaking out.
My question would be: when do members of the president’s inner circle say “look, we have an overseas dilemma where you are portraying us, in terms of the American government, as worse than a tyrant — that is, Vladimir Putin.”
Secretary of Homeland Security came out with statements this week about continued Russian interference. This was not on Obama’s watch. That’s this week. FBI director continues the investigation. Department of Justice continues support for the investigation. Congress continues saying this investigation’s legitimate.
Curious point in American government: when do we see almost a shadow government come out and say “we cannot side with the government,” whether it’s the Babinet or the Senate.
