President Donald Trump is irked that copies of special counsel Robert Mueller’s questions for him were, he alleged, leaked to The New York Times.
On Tuesday morning he tweeted that it was “disgraceful” that the questions were revealed and and hurled his usual “witch hunt” insults at Mueller’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election and the Trump campaign’s contacts with Russia.
So disgraceful that the questions concerning the Russian Witch Hunt were “leaked” to the media. No questions on Collusion. Oh, I see…you have a made up, phony crime, Collusion, that never existed, and an investigation begun with illegally leaked classified information. Nice!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 1, 2018
About an hour later, he tweeted again pushing back on allegations of obstruction of justice. Mueller’s questions reportedly focus, in part, on White House actions that could be interpreted as obstruction of justice, specifically Trump’s response to Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ decision to recuse himself from the Russia investigation.
It would seem very hard to obstruct justice for a crime that never happened! Witch Hunt!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 1, 2018
Trump’s tweets decrying the “leaked” questions follow reports from the New York Times that it had obtained a list of questions that Mueller planned to ask Trump if the President agreed to sit down for an interview with the special counsel.
Mueller’s team reportedly read the list of questions to Trump’s lawyers, who then assembled them into a list. That list was shared with the Times by a person outside of Trump’s legal team, the Times reported.
The questions reportedly focus on a range of topics, including Trump’s motivations for firing former FBI director James Comey, his business dealings and the Trump campaign’s contacts with Russian officials.