Don scolds off-the-wall ex-mayor mouthpiece
President Trump belittled Rudy Giuliani on Friday, saying his new lawyer in the Russia probe “started yesterday,” would eventually “get his facts straight” and “was learning the subject matter” — referring to special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.
Speaking to reporters before his flight to Dallas to address the NRA, the president both unloaded on and defended Giuliani — who was actually hired on April 19 — after the combative exmayor spilled the beans Wednesday on Trump’s hush-money payoff to porn star Stormy Daniels.
“I tell you what — Rudy is a great guy, but he just started a day ago. But he really has his heart into it. He’s working hard. He’s learning the subject matter. And he’s going to be issuing a statement, too. But he is a great guy. He knows it’s a witch hunt. He’s seen a lot of them. And he said he’s never seen anything so horrible,” the president said.
Trump — who bluntly said last month that he knew nothing about the payment — also denied on Friday that the administration had changed its story following Giuliani’s revelation on Sean Hannity’s Fox News cable show.
“We’re not changing any stories. All I’m telling you is that this country is running so smooth right now, and to be bring up that kind of crap, and to be bringing up witch hunts all the time, that’s all you want to talk about,” Trump lectured the reporter who had asked him aboard Air Force One on April 5 whether he was aware of the payment to Daniels.
“No, I don’t know,” the president replied then in a comment captured on video.
Asked about the clear contradiction, the president said without elaborating: “Excuse me, you take a look at what I said. You go back and take a look, you’ll see what I said.”
Trump’s criticism came a day after Giuliani insisted he and the president were on the same page.
“You won’t see daylight between me and the president,” he declared.
Giuliani later Friday did issue a vague statement that sought to clarify his revelation that Trump had reimbursed Trump’s personal attorney and longtime fixer, Michael Cohen, for $130,000 in hush money to Daniels.
Giuliani had also said that the president started paying Cohen a $35,000-a-month retainer shortly after being sworn in — but that Trump had learned that the money went to Daniels only within the past couple of weeks.
“My references to timing were not describing my understanding of the president’s knowledge, but instead, my understanding of these matters,” he said.
The former Gotham mayor said in the statement that he wanted to “clarify the views I expressed over the past few days.”
“There is no campaign violation. The payment was made to resolve a personal and false allegation in order to protect the president’s family,” he said.
“It would have been done in any event, whether he was a candidate or not,” he continued. “It is undisputed that the president’s dismissal of former [FBI] Director [James] Comey — an inferior executive officer — was clearly within his Article II power” under the Constitution.
“Recent revelations about former Director Comey further confirm the wisdom of the president’s decision, which was plainly in the best interests of our nation.”
Daniels’ lawyer, Michael Avenatti, mocked Trump and Giuliani on Twitter.
“Mr. Giuliani and Mr. Trump are making it up as they go along. Never before has that old adage been more appropriate: ‘ Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive.’ How stupid do they think all of us are?” he wrote.
Giuliani’s bombshell disclosure on “Hannity” caught Trump’s political advisers and other lawyers by surprise, according to multiple reports.