[sg_popup id=”2″ event=”hover”][/sg_popup]Report: Jeff Sessions suggested he resign amid growing rift with Trump
Attorney General Jeff Sessions offered to resign at one point in recent months after his relationship with President Donald Trump grew increasingly tense, according to two people close to the White House.
The strain between the two began after Sessions recused himself in March from the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. Sessions announced his recusal shortly after he became attorney general and a day after The Washington Post revealed that he had twice met with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak during the campaign and did not disclose that fact to the Senate Judiciary Committee during his January confirmation hearing.
Trump learned of the attorney general’s decision shortly before Sessions announced it at a news conference. The president’s anger has lingered for months, according to the people close to the White House, who said Trump blames Sessions’s recusal as a factor that prompted the decision last month by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein to appoint a special counsel, Robert Mueller, to oversee the expanding Russian investigation.
Trump has also grown frustrated with the way his travel ban has been stalled in federal courts, the people added. Trump even took to twitter to blast the Justice Department for the “watered down – politically correct” version of the travel ban.
The Justice Dept. should have stayed with the original Travel Ban, not the watered down, politically correct version they submitted to S.C.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 5, 2017
The Justice Dept. should ask for an expedited hearing of the watered down Travel Ban before the Supreme Court – & seek much tougher version!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 5, 2017
