Trump Walks Back Redacting Documents via Tweets

On Monday as was reported @ The News Blender President Trump issued a order via Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, ordering the declassification of documents related to the Russian probe, which is headed by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

During his interview with The Hill on Tuesday, asked if he reviewed the memos himself and what he thought the declassification of documents would show, President Trump told Buck Sexton he had not reviewed them.

Buck Sexton: Have you reviewed the memos yourself? What do you expect them to show, if so?

President Trump: I have not reviewed them. I have been asked by many people in Congress as you know to release them. I have watched commentators that I respect begging the president of the United States to release them. We’re sitting with one right here, we’re sitting with two, you’re right. More than once. And I have had many people ask me to release them. Not that I didn’t like the idea, but I wanted to wait. I wanted to see what, you know, where it was all going. And I think this whole, it’s a hoax. You know Gregg Jarrett wrote a book called the Russian Hoax. It actually is a hoax. I call it a witch hunt, but it’s a hoax. Beyond a witch hunt. 

Later asked about the Russian probe President Trump said exposing the corruption at the DOJ/FBI he hoped would be a crowing achievement. 

President Trump: I think that I hope to be able to put this up as one of my crowning achievements that I was able to do through the help of a lot of good people including you two, and all of the support we have. We have tremendous support by the way, to expose something that is truly a cancer in our country. When you look at the FBI, you know you have eight people or so fired now.

And what we’ve done is a great service to the country, really. You know, I hope, I hope to be able to call this one of, along with tax cuts and regulations, and all of the things I’ve done. You know you’ve been seeing, you probably saw the news conference I just did.

On Friday via Twitter @ 10:35 a.m. and 10:41 a.m. President Trump has announced that instead of declassifying the documents the Inspector General has been asked to review the necessary documents in what the President hopes is “an expedited basis,” he adds, if need be he can, “always declassify if it proves necessary.” 

As a reminder the documents President Trump had asked to be declassify are/were:  

• Page 10-12 and 17-34 of the FISA warrant application obtained Oct. 2016 on former campaign member Cater Page. Plus FBI reports of interviews prepared in connection with requesting and obtaining the FISA warrant. 
• All FBI reports of interviews with Bruce G. Ohr prepared in connection with the Russia investigation. 
• Plus all text messages relating to the Russia investigation sent by or received by former FBI director James Comey, FBI Deputy director Andrew McCabe, former FBI agent Peter Strzok, and former DOJ/FBI attorney Lisa Page and current DOJ attorney Bruce Ohr. 

For What it’s Worth: The Inspector General has already investigated political bias as it pertained to both the Hillary Clinton investigation and the early FBI Russian investigation. The IG report was released to the public in June of 2018 and the Inspector General found no political bias, just mishandling of internal communications.