Here is a transcript and video of Trump’s brief comments on today’s news. Note that there’s no discussion of Cohen, only Manafort – transcript per pool report.
"Nothing to do with Russian collusion, continue with the witch hunt." Trump briefly talks Manafort; mum on Cohen. pic.twitter.com/8x8YswReFQ
— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) August 21, 2018
Transcript after the jump …
POTUS: “I must tell you that Paul Manafort’s a good man. He was with Ronald Reagan, he was with a lot of different people over the years and I feel very sad about that. Doesn’t involve me but I still feel, you know, it’s a very sad thing that happened. This has nothing to do with Russian collusion. This started as Russian collusion, this has absolutely nothing to do, this is a witch hunt that ends in disgrace. But this has nothing to do what they started out, looking for Russians involved in our campaign. There were none. I feel very badly for Paul Manafort. again he worked for bob dole, he worked for Ronald Reagan he worked for many, many people and … the way it ends up. It was not the original mission, believe me. It was something very much different. So, had nothing to do with Russian collusion. We continue the witch hunt.”
