Final decision on press briefings will be in the next few weeks, Trump says
President Trump said in an interview with Fox News' Jeanine Pirro that "fake news" about Russia and former FBI Director James Comey had overshadowed some of his accomplishments so far in office.
Mr. Trump, who tweeted Friday morning he is considered canceling the daily press briefing, said he would make a decision over the next few weeks if he would cancel them. But he appeared to be saying the press briefings would perhaps be smoother if he himself was at the helm.
- Trump says it would not be "inappropriate" to ask for Comey's loyalty
- Trump says pick for next FBI director could be announced within days
Mr. Trump said they would do press briefings differently: "We do it through a piece of paper with a perfectly accurate, beautiful answer. I'll give you an example .. They're asked 100 questions, or 50 questions, or 20 questions -- if they get one out of 50, just a little bit off, 5 percent, 10 percent, 20 percent, it's -- the next day, it's a front page story in every newspaper."
But, Mr. Trump said, "I'll tell you what, they'll be very unhappy, because the ratings are so high that I don't know what these networks are going to do. They're going to start to cry .. They get free ratings because of me, and yet they don't treat us well."
Mr. Trump said he is considering giving his own press briefings every two weeks. When asked if White House press secretary Sean Spicer would be there tomorrow, Mr. Trump answered "he's doing a great job, he's getting beaten up."
"Sarah Huckabee [Sanders] is a lovely young woman. You know Sean Spicer. He is a wonderful human -- he's a nice man," Mr. Trump said.
Despite the controversy over Comey's firing, Mr. Trump said his week was "great," and he said "there's no good time to fire someone."
"Let's say I did it on January 20, the opening, right, and that would have been the big story as opposed to the inauguration," Mr. Trump said. "I was thinking about it then. I was thinking about it during this period of time."
Mr. Trump said he did not ask Comey for his loyalty, but he said he didn't think it was an inapporpriate thing to ask.
"I think loyalty to the country, loyalty to the U.S. is important -- you know, it depends on how you define loyalty, number one," Mr. Trump said.
Mr. Trump insisted Comey "gave [Hillary] a free pass, like nobody's ever, ever gotten a free pass," but Mr. Trump said he was "surpised" by the reaction from the Democrats because he thought it would be a "very popular thing."
Although Mr. Trump admitted the Democrats' reaction to Comey's firing could be boiled down to "look, it's politics," he said the Democrats said "we get some political points, we'll go against Trump."
Mr. Trump said "there was no collusion" with Russia, but said he wanted "to get to the bottom, if Russia or anybody else is trying to tamper or play with our election."
As for Mr. Trump's comments about "tapes" of Comey, Mr. Trump said "I can't talk about that."
