Trump is once again attacking his own attorney general Jeff Sessions, but this time he’s criticizing far more than just Sessions recusal early last year on the Russia investigation.
THE HILL – President Trump in an Oval Office interview with Hill.TV launched one of his most ferocious broadsides to date against Jeff Sessions, suggesting the attorney general was essentially AWOL and performing badly on a variety of issues.
“I don’t have an attorney general. It’s very sad,” Trump told Hill.TV in an extensive and freewheeling interview Tuesday from the Oval Office.
The president has long excoriated Sessions for his March 2017 decision to recuse himself from the Russia collusion investigation. But on Tuesday he suggested he is frustrated by Sessions’s performance on far more than that.
“I’m not happy at the border, I’m not happy with numerous things, not just this,” he said.
Trump suggested he had a personal blind spot when it came to nominating Sessions as the nation’s top law enforcement officer.
“I’m so sad over Jeff Sessions because he came to me. He was the first senator that endorsed me. And he wanted to be attorney general, and I didn’t see it,” he said.
“And then he went through the nominating process and he did very poorly. I mean, he was mixed up and confused, and people that worked with him for, you know, a long time in the Senate were not nice to him, but he was giving very confusing answers. Answers that should have been easily answered. And that was a rough time for him.”
Trump was asked about it by the press this morning and he just reiterated that he was disappointed in Sessions for ‘many reasons’:
.@POTUS: "I'm disappointed in the attorney general for numerous reasons." pic.twitter.com/MCBZ257r6l
— FOX Business (@FoxBusiness) September 19, 2018
You all know that I hate the way Trump attacks Sessions, on Twitter and in interviews like this. I really find it distasteful and unprofessional.
That said, I have no idea why Sessions hasn’t just resigned. He knows Trump is unhappy with him and whether you like Trump’s handling of this or not, it just seems to me that Sessions should step down and let Trump appoint another AG, at least while he still has the Senate.