Washington,<\/p>\n
Donald Trump lashed out Friday after memos of his meetings with the FBI\u2019s then chief James Comey depicted the president as obsessed with the Russia probe and a smutty video allegedly showing him with two prostitutes.<\/p>\n
But the memos were just the latest twist in a week of awful headlines for Trump: from the release of a bestselling book in which Comey labels him \u201cmorally unfit,\u201d to a courtroom circus featuring his embattled personal lawyer and a porn star who alleges a tryst with Trump.<\/p>\n
Trump\u2019s legal and personal woes\u2014and wall-to-wall Comey book interviews\u2014overshadowed his summit with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, at which the president confirmed CIA chief Mike Pompeo had met Kim Jong Un in Pyongyang to lay the groundwork for an upcoming summit with Trump himself.<\/p>\n
As the week drew to a close, the flurry of developments on the North Korean front were once again eclipsed by the Comey memos\u2014which depict Trump pressuring the FBI chief over the probe into his campaign\u2019s links to Russia before firing him, and could bolster potential obstruction of justice allegations.<\/p>\n
\u201cJames Comey Memos just out and show clearly that there was NO COLLUSION and NO OBSTRUCTION. Also, he leaked classified information. WOW! Will the Witch Hunt continue?\u201d Trump tweeted Friday in response to the documents.<\/p>\n
And to top it off, on Friday the Democratic Party filed a lawsuit in New York alleging the Trump campaign, the Russian government and WikiLeaks conspired to skew the 2016 presidential election toward the Republican.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe must prevent future attacks on our democracy, and that\u2019s exactly what we\u2019re doing today,\u201d said Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf the occupant of the Oval Office won\u2019t protect our democracy, Democrats will. \u201cTrump\u2019s legal problems reach back to the beginning of his presidency, but have multiplied.<\/p>\n
Two weeks ago FBI agents raided the New York residences and offices of his longtime personal lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen, seizing files that could bare Trump\u2019s past business dealings and expose more about his relationships with several women in the 2000s, when he was married.<\/p>\n
One of them, the porn actress Stormy Daniels, whom Cohen paid $130,000 to keep quiet about an alleged affair with Trump in 2006, showed up to much publicity at the first hearing over the Cohen raid.<\/p>\n
Days later she went on the hit show The View where she said she was threatened not to talk about her Trump affair.<\/p>\n
Daniels and Trump are now locked in duelling lawsuits that serve to keep the alleged tryst in the headlines.<\/p>\n
Separately, Trump is battling a lawsuit that alleges he is breaking anti-corruption clauses in the US Constitution by profiting from the use of his namesake Washington hotel by foreign dignitaries.<\/p>\n
Most ominous of all, Trump is under pressure from Special Counsel Robert Mueller\u2019s investigation into links between his campaign and Russia, a probe that is also examining possible obstruction by the president.<\/p>\n
That investigation has numerous top aides and possibly family members of Trump in its sights. In recent weeks, according to reports, Trump has considered firing both Mueller and the Justice Department\u2019s number two, Rod Rosenstein, whom Trump himself appointed a year ago.<\/p>\n
In a tweet late on Friday night, Trump wrote: \u201cJames Comey illegally leaked classified documents to the press in order to generate a Special Council? Therefore, the Special Council was established based on an illegal act? Really, does everybody know what that means?\u201d It is not the first time Trump has misspelled the word \u201ccounsel.\u201d Trump and the Republicans have sought to undermine Mueller\u2019s probe by discrediting him and his team as biased and corrupt.<\/p>\n
But Comey\u2019s new book, \u201cA Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies and Leadership,\u201d has deflected questions back to the president. Comey likens Trump to a Mafia boss who demands absolute loyalty, and lacks any moral foundation.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis president is unethical, and untethered to truth and institutional values,\u201d he writes.<\/p>\n
\u201cHis leadership is transactional, ego driven and about personal loyalty.\u201d The book, and the memos released by Congress, add support to allegations Trump wanted to suppress the Russia probe and fired Comey because of it.<\/p>\n
The strain on the White House is clear. On Thursday Trump added three new attorneys, including former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani and two white collar criminal defense specialists.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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