Page 753 - Wolf News Today

President trumps lead lawyer handling the russia investigation has now resigned, adding to the legal drama playing out among his personal attorneys. john dowds departure comes as the president has stepped up his attacks against the special counsel robert mueller. it also comes right in the middle of negotiations over whether the president will actually sit down for an interview with robert mueller. another of the presidents lawyers, jay sekulow, issued this statement. quote, john dowd is a frien...

Any bitterness, without any meanness. hes going out like a gentleman. certainly he has some bitterness about how he was treated, wolf. >> john, what do you think? >> i think she is right. he certainly is getting a lot of sympathy, and rightly so, by the way he was let go. no question about that at all. he wont go down as one of our best chief diplomats. didnt get the respect he needed to really get the job done. and he didnt really stand up for the career foreign service. weve seen them leave al...

As a secretary, everybody knows they h he had a very frought relationship with this department. there were questions about his leadership, some of his policies and not defending the staff budget in terms of the white house wanting to cut 30% of the budget. but in the end, rex tillerson has a lot of sympathy for the way president trump treated him, and i think hes going out -- i think when he talks about integrity, you always have your integrity, thats what people are saluting here right now. he ...

Happening. now, we were asking senior officials all last week and earlier this week, is this going to happen? and the white house chief of staff and others said the president still has the confidence of h.r. mcmaster. but clearly you wonder if something changed, perhaps earlier this week. that phone call with vladimir putin that the president made. there was a leak in this white house by, its suspected at least, by perhaps someone on the national security team, who said that he was advised not t...

We asked the president if he would like to testify before special counsel robert mueller. he said weeks ago that hes excited about the. he said, i would like to -- i would like to --. speckly he was asked if this represents a new strategy and he did not answer. the president, in his view, was standing just about two feet from me, looking me directly in the eyes, and he said, yes, i would like to. we will see if thiz lawyers agree with that. he is indeed changing up his legal strategy, as weve se...

>> reporter: wolf, there is no question here that h.r. mcmaster, general mcmaster, was brought in at a very turbulent moment to smooth things out and, indeed, to keep things sort of afloat. if youll remember back more than -- about a year or so ago, a very abrupt beginning to this administration with michael flynn. of course, his abrupt firing after he was said to, you know, mislead the vice president. general mcmaster came in and took the reins. but as barbara was saying, such a different forei...

Counsel robert mueller, sir? >> thank you. i would like to. >> reporter: so the president there is saying directly, "i would like to," but wolf, that has been the subject of some of this disagreement here between some of the lawyers. john dowd, of course, the lead lawyer here was not advising that. he was hoping the president would not testify. so now we will see how this more aggressive legal strategy is going to play out here, as this does come to a head at some point soon. of course, the pres...

The president again feeling more confident to follow his own instinct that, you know, really led him here. taking a harder line approach. he knows this midterm election year is going to be a bruising one. hes already thinking ahead to 2020. he wants to take a harder approach on everything. the question here is, as barbara was saying, will his military follow. what other steps are left? well, white house chief of staff john kelly also be gone at some place? that, of course, has also been much in ...

Bolton, a former ambassador to the united nations. he was here meeting with the president. we saw him go into the west wing and then he left about an hour or so later. advisers and aides here say it was simply a routine meeting. he meets the president often. but wolf, what it was, was the final job interview with john bolton and the president. now, wolf, this is coming at a very critical time here. we have been reporting this for, i would say, the last two weeks or so, that h.r. mcmaster is goin...

Probe, he was just growing frustrated that the president wasnt listening to his advice. also, he felt slighted this week when joe digenova was added to the legal team. so all of this combined is what sort of led to john dowd going to the president and saying he wanted to resign. but on the presidents side, he has been telling aides, according to sources, that hes been growing frustrated with dowd. that he feels like the legal strategy is not working. this cooperative approach isnt the right way ...