President Donald Trump tweeted in response to an interview his son, Donald Trump Jr., gave to ardent Trump supporter Sean Hannity on Tuesday night. On the Fox News show “Hannity,” Trump Jr. addressed the recent scandal surrounding a meeting he took with a Russian lawyer during his father’s campaign to become president.
“My son Donald did a good job last night. He was open, transparent and innocent,” the president wrote. “This is the greatest Witch Hunt in political history. Sad!”
Trump Sr.’s reference to a “witch hunt” has become his label for the ongoing investigation into Russian interference during the 2016 presidential election.
Trump Sr. then, once again, took aim at the media in another tweet. “Remember, when you hear the words ‘sources say’ from the Fake Media, often times those sources are made up and do not exist,” the president wrote.
Trump Jr.’s television appearance came after the New York Times broke several stories related to a meeting the president’s son took with Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya, who has ties to the Kremlin. Veselnitskaya promised dirt on then-candidate Hillary Clinton. After the Times secured copies of emails exchanged between Trump Jr. and publicist, Rob Goldstone, the president’s son tweeted out photos of the entire exchange.
During the interview, Trump Jr. told Hannity that he was interested in conducting opposition research, and emphasized that the political implications of meeting with a Russian official was not as charged as it has become since the meeting. Still, he conceded, “In retrospect I probably would have done things differently.”
Until the tweets, Trump’s only comment on the situation was read by White House Deputy Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders at Tuesday afternoon’s off-camera press briefing: “My son is a high-quality person and I applaud his transparency,” Sanders read.
Several hours after the tweets about his son, president Trump tweeted that he is focusing on policy and has “very little time for watching T.V.” The statement comes despite his tendency to post reactions to coverage of his administration on cable news, and his administration’s ongoing battle with scandals unrelated to policy, and sometimes related to his own tweets.
My son Donald did a good job last night. He was open, transparent and innocent. This is the greatest Witch Hunt in political history. Sad!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 12, 2017
