President Trump predicted Friday that a government watchdog report on the origins of the Russian investigation that consumed two years of his presidency will be “historic” — and said he wants a trial in the Senate if the House votes to impeach him.
In his wide-ranging interview with Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends,” Trump said he does not expect to be impeached, claiming the Democrats — whom he said “looked like fools” during the public hearings in the impeachment inquiry — have “absolutely nothing incriminating.”
“I think it’s very hard to impeach you when they have absolutely nothing,” he said, adding that if the House does vote to impeach him, he would welcome a trial in the Republican-controlled Senate.
“I want a trial,” he said, adding that among the witnesses he would like to hear from in a trial would be the whistleblower whose report led to the impeachment inquiry.
The whistleblower’s identity remains secret — though the president said he knows who the person is.
Trump discussed the upcoming release of Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s report on the FBI’s adherence to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act requirements during the 2016 campaign.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said Wednesday that the report is expected to be released Dec. 9.
“So, you have a FISA report coming out, which the word is, it’s historic. That’s what the word is, that’s what I hear,” Trump said.
“Now, what you’re going to see, I predict, will be perhaps the biggest scandal in the history of our country,” he continued, adding that he is letting Attorney General William Barr “handle it.”
“And, if it’s historic, you’re going to see something. And then, perhaps even more importantly, you have [John Durham’s report] coming out shortly thereafter — the US attorney — and he’s already announced it’s criminal,” he added.
The president was asked about reports that a former FBI lawyer allegedly altered a document related to surveillance of his campaign adviser Carter Page during the 2016 election.
In 2016, the Justice Department and the FBI obtained warrants to place Page under surveillance. It is so far unclear whether Page was the only Trump official against whom the DOJ obtained a FISA warrant.
“I’ll tell you what, you have a lot of very bad people,” Trump said, accusing top-level Obama administration officials of authorizing “spying” on his 2016 campaign.
The evidence of the altered document was turned over to Durham, who is investigating how intelligence was gathered by agencies including the CIA and FBI during the probe into the Trump campaign, according to CNN.
It was unclear what role the altered document played in the probe into Page — or if a FISA warrant against him would have been OK’d without the fudged document, according to the report.
Trump and his supporters have repeatedly claimed the security agencies took shady steps in their investigation into his 2016 campaign’s relationship with Russia.
Horowitz has been probing how the infamous anti-Trump dossier compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele was used to secure the original FISA warrant for Page in October 2016, in addition to three renewals.
He also has looked into why the FBI may have regarded Steele – funded by the Hillary Clinton campaign through law firm Perkins Coie – a credible source, and why the bureau used news reports to bolster Steele’s credibility before the FISA court.
The president on Friday also said he was trying to root out corruption in Ukraine when he withheld almost $400 million aid over the summer.
His July 25 call with President Volodymr Zelensky is at the center of the House impeachment probe, which is looking into Trump’s pressure on Ukraine to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter as he held back the aid.
Trump continued to assert that “there was no quid pro quo,” contradicting testimony by impeachment witnesses, including US Ambassador the European Union Gordon Sondland.
“That’s total nonsense,” Trump said as he defended his efforts to press Ukraine to investigate the Bidens. “Why should we give money to a country that is known corrupt?”
“I hardly know him,” Trump also said about Sondland, a hotelier and GOP mega-donor. “I have spoken to him a few times.”
The president also denied State Department official David Holmes’ testimony about a cell phone conversation he overheard between Sondland and Trump on July 26 — a day after the phone call in which Trump asked Zelensky to investigate the Bidens.
“I guarantee you that never took place,” Trump said.
On Wednesday, Sondland testified that a White House meeting with Zelensky was contingent on Ukraine launching probes into 2016 election interference and a gas company that employed Hunter on its board.
The ambassador also said he presumed the frozen aid was contingent on Ukraine publicly announcing the probes but said Trump never told him directly of a quid pro quo related to the aid.
Sondland said he and other officials worked with Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani “at the express direction” of the president, who on Friday praised the former New York City mayor as a “great crime fighter” whom he wanted to tackle corruption in Ukraine.
Trump slammed Sondland for not saying in his opening statement before the House Intelligence Committee that Trump told him during a phone call in September that he wanted “nothing” and “no quid pro quo” from Ukraine.
“I want nothing – he said that when he was testifying,” he said. “They didn’t put that in. That was the end of him. I turned off the television.”
In other comments, the president assailed Marie Yovanovitch, whom he removed as US ambassador to Ukraine and who also testified in the impeaching hearing. Trump suggested that she was treated with kid gloves because she’s a woman.
“I said, ‘Why are you being so kind?’ ‘Well, sir, she’s a woman. We have to be nice,’ ” he said, also criticizing her for not hanging up his portrait in the US Embassy in Ukraine.
“She’s very tough. I heard bad things,” he added as he dismissed her as “an Obama person.”
“This was not an angel this woman, OK?” Trump said. “And there was a lot of things that she did that I didn’t like, and we’ll talk about that at some point, but I just want to let you know, this was not a baby that we’re dealing with.”