Washington - US President Donald Trump wants an investigation
into The New York Times over the publication this week of an article
by an unnamed senior administration official who described a White
House where aides try to restrain the president's worst impulses.
"It's national security. I would say Jeff should be investigating who
the author of that piece was because I really believe it's national
security," Trump said, referring to Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
He said he was "looking" at whether the paper itself should face
action.
"Eventually the name of this sick person will come out," Trump said
about the author, while also offering up the option that the writer
does not exist.
"Maybe the Times did it. Look, the Times uses phony
sources all the time."
Trump described the White House as a "well-oiled machine."
The president has questioned whether the publication of the article
was an act of treason.
There has also been criticism of the piece from Trump's opponents,
who have decried what was effectively unelected government employees
taking on roles they were not assigned and should not have in a
democracy.
Former president Barack Obama was among the critics, speaking at a
university in Illinois, as part of a campaign to encourage voting in
the mid-term elections in November
"These people aren't elected. They are not accountable. They are not
doing us a service by actively promoting 90 per cent of the crazy
stuff that's coming out of the White House and then saying 'Don't
worry we are preventing the other 10%,' " he said. "This is
not normal."