Former president Donald Trump slammed Fox News host Bret Baier on Monday evening, a week after their interview where Mr Trump revealed he took documents. Mr Trump is facing a federal indictment over his retention of classified documents, including some related to national defence information.
Mr Trump spoke on Newsmax on Monday evening and complained about the interview.
“I thought it was fine, I thought it was ok, but there was nothing friendly about it,” he said. “It was nasty, and I thought I did a good job.”
Mr Trump said he had received credit for doing the interview but said people also wondered why he did the interview. During his exchange with Baier, Mr Trump called Fox News a “hostile” network and declined to commit to participating in the first GOP debate in August.
“Everything was unfriendly,” he said. “No smiling. No, ‘let’s have fun, let’s make America great again.’ Everything was like a hit.”
Mr Trump said he was not interested in cooperating with a hostile network and with candidates who oppose him.
“If you’re leading by 30 or 40 or 50 points, what’s the purpose of really doing it,” he said.
Last week, the former president did an interview with Mr Baier after he was indicted and arraigned in a federal court in Miami. In the interview, Mr Trump said he did not turn over classified documents to the US National Archives and Records Administration because he was “very busy.”
“I want to go through the boxes and get all my personal things out. I don’t want to hand that over to (National Archives) yet. And I was very busy, as you’ve sort of seen,” he said. “The answer, in addition to having every right under the Presidential Records Act, is that these boxes were containing all types of personal belongings — many, many things, shirts and shoes, everything.”
In addition, the former president denied that he ever possessed a secret document detailing a potential military attack on Iran despite the fact that the indictment said that he showed a plan to attack Iran that was considered “highly confidential.”
On Monday evening, CNN broadcasted the audio of Mr Trump showing the map to a writer who was helping Mr Trump’s former chief of staff Mark Meadows write a memoir.
