Donald Trump accuses Russia probe investigators of conflicts of interest

Donald Trump. File pic

President Donald Trump on Monday accused the team of investigators headed by Special Counsel Robert Mueller of having "conflicts of interest" in their probe of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. "The 13 Angry Democrats in charge of the Russian Witch Hunt are starting to find out that there is a Court System in place that actually protects people from injustice... and just wait 'till the Courts get to see your unrevealed Conflicts of Interest!" Trump wrote on Twitter.

The President regularly uses the term "witch hunt" when referring to the investigation and says that the investigators handling it are Democrats, despite the fact that Mueller himself is a registered Republican, Efe reported. Trump also said in his series of Monday morning tweets that the investigation "is rapidly losing credibility" after the Republican-controlled House Intelligence Committee in April concluded - prematurely, according to Democratic lawmakers - that there was no collusion between the mogul's presidential campaign and the Kremlin.

"So now the Probe says OK, what else is there? How about Obstruction for a made up, phony crime. There is no O, it's called Fighting Back," the president tweeted. The Democratic opposition has warned about the consequences if Trump were to fire Mueller, a move that could open the door to an accusation of obstruction of justice.

Last week, The New York Times reported that it had obtained an unofficial and non-verbatim list of 49 questions that Mueller wants to ask Trump, who - in turn - complained that the list had been "leaked" to the media, although it appears that it was someone closely associated with his own legal team who did so. The team pursuing the Russia probe had provided the questions to Trump's attorneys, headed at the time by John Dowd, with the aim of convincing them to allow Mueller to question the president, something that the two sides have been discussing for months. Last Friday, Trump said during his address to the National Rifle Association that he "would love" to speak with Mueller because he and his campaign team did "nothing wrong."

(Edited by mid-day online desk with inputs from IANS)

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