President Trump spoke with reporters aboard Air Force One Friday, and, according to the transcript of a recording captured by The Washington Post's Josh Dawsey, the president's remarks were a meandering mess.
Number one, there is no obstruction. Number two, everybody that looked at anybody over there, they get ‘em on some kind of a lie.
I see Papadopoulos today, I don’t know Papadopoulos, I don’t know. I saw him sitting in one picture at a table with me that’s the only thing I know about him. They got him on, I guess, on a couple of lies.
George Papadopoulos is being sentenced today. The prosecution has recommended he serve zero to six months' time for lying to the FBI and hindering the Russia investigation.
The president continued:
[Michael] Flynn, where the FBI said he didn’t lie, but Mueller’s people said he did lie, so I don’t want to be set up with a perjury trap.
CNN:
Trump's comments echoed the message from his personal legal team, which has repeatedly expressed concerns that Trump could perjure himself if he sits down with Mueller. Rudy Giuliani, one of Trump's attorneys, famously said last month that he believes Trump could face perjury charges even if he tells the truth, saying: "Truth isn't truth."
More from the transcript:
Number two, there was no obstruction, there was no collusion. One of the things that was interesting about this ridiculous book. He hardly covered collusion at all.
The president appears to conflate publicized excerpts from Bob Woodword's upcoming book with Robert Mueller's ongoing Russia investigation. The former has nothing to do with the latter.
There was no talking to Russia. There was no phone calls. I didn’t make phone calls to Russia. I didn’t receive phone calls. I didn’t have meetings. I didn’t have texts. Anything. I have nothing to do with Russia.
If we’re going to meet, it’s got to be a fair meeting.
Remember this: Article Two, number one you have Article Two provision, that covers everything. Despite Article Two, there was no obstruction, there was no collusion.
Everyone has given up at collusion. I didn’t meet with Russians because I love the United States.
If I met with Russians, you people would have found out. You know everything I’m doing. You don’t always report it correctly. But I’m used to it.
The interesting thing about the book — I figured it’d have chapters of nonsense — he couldn’t find anything about collusion in that big, fat ugly book with all the misquotes and all the lies.
I’d do it, but under certain circumstances. It’s a big waste of time. There was no collusion.
It’s such a sad thing for our country to be going through a witch hunt like that. It’s so hard for us to deal with other countries including Russia because of that witch hunt. It endangers our country. It puts us at a big disadvantage all because of the rigged phony witch hunt.
This is a favorite Kremlin talking point. Vladimir Putin often says the Russia investigation is standing in the way of better U.S.-Russia relations.
You have 17 angry Democrats, now they’re making it smaller, I guess they’ve given up on no collusion stuff. You have people that are highly conflicted. Why don’t we have some Republicans on it? People that were at Hillary Clinton’s — I call it Hillary Clinton’s funeral, that was the night she lost the election. It was a funeral, it was a wake. People that are on Mueller’s team who are there crying, they were crying. What kind of a probe is that?
Bob Mueller and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein both are Republicans. The Justice Department does not operate on partisanship. Career intelligence officials put country over party.
All of that being said, I must tell you, I’m not the target of an investigation. You do know that.
With that being said, we have to get it over with. It’s really bad for the country. It’s really unfair for our midterms. Really, really unfair for the midterms.
I watched Jim Dowd, a very good guy, a very good lawyer, he was devastated. He kept giving me dates. He thought this would be over. He thought this would have been over many months ago. He was devastated by it.
John Dowd resigned in March.
Trump frets over 'perjury trap' if he sits down with Mueller (CNN)
Trump’s off-the-cuff comments on Robert Mueller, annotated (WaPo)