White House chief of staff John Kelly said the reaction of the Trump administration to Monday’s news of indictments is to “let the legal justice system work.”
“I think the reaction of the administration is let the legal justice system work, everyone’s innocent until — presumed innocent — and we’ll see where it goes,” Kelly said on Fox News’ “The Ingraham Angle” on Monday night.
Former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and former Trump campaign official Rick Gates surrendered Monday to Justice Department special counsel Robert Mueller, and former Trump campaign foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos pleaded guilty to making a false statement to the FBI after he lied about his interactions with foreign officials close to the Russian government.
White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said Monday that the President has “no intention or plan” to fire Mueller.
Kelly also shared a similar sentiment to President Donald Trump’s initial reaction Monday morning, when the President tweeted: “Sorry, but this is years ago, before Paul Manafort was part of the Trump campaign. But why aren’t Crooked Hillary & the Dems the focus?????”
The charges against Manafort and Gates date back prior to their work on the Trump campaign, but his tweet was posted before the Papadopoulos plea was unsealed.
“All of the activity, as I understand it they were indicted for, were long before they ever met Donald Trump or had any association with the campaign,” Kelly told Ingraham.
When asked if the indictments were a difficult moment for the staff, Kelly said he thought the staff was “very comfortable with simply serving the nation.
“And the vast majority of the staff would have nothing to do with any of this kind of thing,” Kelly added.
