Trump investigation designed to 'impeach or embarrass' president, furious leading Republican claims amid fury at Manafort sentence
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Your support makes all the difference.President Donald Trump has again attacked the “witch hunt hoax” embroiling his administration following the sentencing of ex-campaign manager Paul Manafort, declaring the outcome proved “no collusion” with Russia as Democrats decried the lenience of Manafort’s 47-month sentence as a “miscarriage of justice”.
Departing for Alabama to tour the state’s devastation by a recent tornado, the president found time to denounce his opposition as an “anti-Israel, anti-Jewish” party over Congresswoman Ilhan Omar‘s comments on the influence of Israeli interest groups in Washington, despite the House having passed a resolution condemning prejudice of all kinds by 402 to 23.
Meanwhile, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, Doug Collins, has sent a scathing letter to its chairman, Jerrold Nadler, attacking the panel’s motivations in investigating the president for abuse of power, saying: “Either you intend to impeach the president, for alleged crimes that have yet to be discovered, or you intend to embarrass him.”
Manafort, was sentenced on Thursday by a federal judge to nearly four years in prison for tax and bank fraud related to his work advising Ukrainian politicians. The charges were unrelated to his work on Mr Trump’s campaign or the focus of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.
The president repeated on Friday as he departed the White House to survey tornado damage in Alabama that Manafort’s case “had nothing to do with Russia.”
It has been a "very, very tough time" for Manafort, he added.
In Alabama, the president signed Bibles at a local Baptist church and took photos with survivors of the deadly tornado outbreak that killed nearly two dozen people.
Mr Trump used a felt pen to scratch out his signature on the cover of a little girl’s Bible, which is decorated with pink camouflage, and first lady Melania Trump then added her signature.
The president and first lady surveyed the damage on Friday, meeting with local officials and victims. They also visited a makeshift disaster relief center set up at the church.
Additional reporting by AP. Check out The Independent's live coverage from Friday below.
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Meanwhile, the US economy added only 20,000 jobs in February, a surprisingly low number that bucked the trend of huge jobs gains in recent months. This was the fewest jobs gained in a month since September 2017.
Wall Street was set to open sharply lower on Friday as a result of the news, adding to global growth worries sparked by weak China export data and weakness in eurozone.
"The poor number indicates that we are suffering alongside the rest of the global economy and that it is having an impact on the US," said Paul Nolte, portfolio manager at Kingsview Asset Management in Chicago.
"The US has been the best house in a lousy neighborhood and maybe that is changing."
Venezuela has also been on the agenda in Washington today, given the the country's worst-ever power outage.
President Nicolas Maduro - still holding firm despite the challenge from National Assembly chairman Juan Guaido, backed by the Trump administration - ordered schools and all government entities closed and told businesses not to open to facilitate work crews trying to restore power.
By many accounts the blackout hit 22 of 23 states and struck the capital at the peak of the evening rush hour on Thursday, sending thousands of people on long nighttime treks home through some of the world's most violent streets.
Until now, Caracas has been spared the worst of a collapse in the nation's grid, but the outage was still wreaking havoc more than 16 hours after it began.
US secretary of state Mike Pompeo, observing all this, has some snappy, if menacing rhetoric for President Maduro.
Here's Adam Forrest's report on the president's comments from the White House lawn.
Under-fire Minnesota Democratic representative Ilhan Omar reminds her followers today marks 24 years since she arrived in the US with her family from Somalia.
What a strange situation she finds herself in on the anniversary of an extraordinary journey.
This is nice on Paul Manafort's "otherwise blameless life".
See also: "Other than that, how was the play, Mrs Lincoln?"
Rudy Giuliani, who just retweeted Donald Trump's latest attack on Cohen, has this to say on the Manafort sentencing.
This is new.
Mr Shine is a veteran of Fox News and the development follows The New Yorker's damning article on the relationship between the right-wing broadcaster and the White House earlier this week, in which he was regularly mentioned.
More on that to follow, no doubt.
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