Trump news: US nuclear arsenal now 'in tippy-top shape' says president when asked about responding to Iran: 'We should all pray we don't have to use them'
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Your support makes all the difference.Donald Trump has defended himself on Twitter as his administration faces an extraordinary showdown with Congress after acting national intelligence director Joseph Maguire withheld a whistleblower’s complaint understood to concern a private conversation between the president and a foreign leader, despite its being classified a matter of “urgent concern”.
He also told reporters that they should "look into Joe Biden" when asked about the whistleblower's complaint, in an angry press conference in the Oval Office, during which he called the whistleblower "bipartisan," though he said he did not know who the person was.
Later, The Wall Street Journal reported that the president asked Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukranian president, to investigate Joe Biden's son "about eight times" during one phone call in July.
The White House said the president will meet with Mr Zelensky next week.
The House Intelligence Committee has not ruled out going to court to force Mr Maguire’s hand, according to the panel’s chairman Adam Schiff, as The Washington Post and New York Times report at least part of the mystery complaint involves Ukraine.
The president’s former secretary of state Rex Tillerson has meanwhile told Harvard University that the administration “got played” by Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whom he described as “a bit Machiavellian”.
The president did not mention Friday's wildly successful climate strike at all today.
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Trump was asked about how to respond to Iran. He suddenly starting talking about his renovation of the US's nuclear arsenal:
Meanwhile, on South Asia, he said the US could win quickly in Afghanistan using a "certain method of war", but that would kill "tens of millions of people", and "we think it's unnecessary". (Courtesy of Daniel Dale)
Here's those quotes from Trump, via Reuters.
"I think the sanctions work," he said, in reference to Iran. "The military would work. That's a very severe form of winning."
Via Reuters: Matt Pottinger, the White House's senior Asia advisor, is expected to become the top deputy for Trump's new national security advisor, Robert O'Brien,
California and 23 other states have sued the Trump administration for reversing the state's authority to set its own rules for tailpipe emissions.
"The administration insists on attacking the authority of California and other states to tackle air pollution and protect public health," said California's attorney general Xavier Becerra in a statement. "President Trump should have at least read the instruction manual he inherited when he assumed the presidency, in particular the chapter on respecting the rule of law."
Read more, from The New York Times:
↵An update on the president's Ukraine phone call:
Here's further background on the call, which prompted a whistleblower to file a complaint:
An earlier statement from Nancy Pelosi on the whistleblower situation:
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