US president Donald Trump hit out at his attorney general, Jeff Sessions, on Wednesday, declaring that he wished he had never appointed him.
In a series of morning Twitter posts Mr Trump quoted Republican congressman Trey Gowdy, who expressed sympathy for the president's frustration with the attorney general in a morning TV interview on CBS. Quoting Mr Gowdy, who said "there are lots of really good lawyers in the country; he could have picked someone else", Mr Trump tweeted: "And I wish I did!"
Mr Trump’s post was the latest in a series of complaints by the president about Mr Sessions, the former Alabama senator who was appointed by the president as the nation’s top law official.
Mr Sessions’s decision last year to recuse himself from the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, following confirmation that he had failed to fully inform the Senate of his dealings with Russia’s US ambassador, infuriated the president.
Mr Trump made no mention of Mr Sessions in later appearances during the day, but his early-morning Twitter post followed a story overnight in the New York Times that Mr Trump asked Mr Sessions to reconsider his recusal at a meeting in Mar-a-Lago in March last year. That meeting is now being investigated by the special counsel investigation led by Robert Mueller, the newspaper reported.
Mr Trump has since then described Mr Sessions as "beleaguered" and asked why the attorney general is not investigating Hillary Clinton.
Asked about Mr Trump's comments, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said that the president had made his views known, adding: "I don't have any personnel announcements at this point."
Russian inquiry
More than a year since a special counsel was appointed to investigate Russian interference in the election, the inquiry is continuing amid expectations that Mr Trump could be interviewed by the special counsel’s team before September.
At a court hearing in New York on Wednesday, lawyers for Mr Trump's former lawyer Michael Cohen were told they must speed up their survey of documents seized by the FBI in April to determine which are covered by attorney-client privilege. The process is being overseen by a court-appointed special master. The judge gave the team until June 15th to finish the trawl, suggesting the process was moving too slowly.
Mr Trump also hit out at the "failing and corrupt" New York Times on Twitter on Wednesday, for estimating the crowd at a rally in Nashville held by the president at 1,000 people, arguing that it was "many times that number".
“This is the way they demean and disparage. They are very dishonest people who don’t ‘get’ me, and never did!” he said.
Mr Trump referenced the "fake news" media several times during his rally in Tennessee on Tuesday night, which was held to rally support for Republican candidate Marsha Blackburn. She is running to replace senator Bob Corker, who is retiring this year. At three separate points during his hour-long speech he lambasted the media, pointing to the media section in the arena.
