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Trump Dismisses Impeachment Hearings

Ardita Dunellari

   WASHINGTON - U.S. President Donald Trump is doubling down on his claims
   that the impeachment inquiry is another episode in his political
   opponents' long saga to block him from winning the election, and to
   overthrow his presidency.

   A day after Democratic lawmakers concluded a second week of public
   testimony from White House officials and other administration
   officials, the president renewed his accusations against the Democrats
   in a nearly hour-long live phone interview with a Fox News Channel
   program.

   While speaking with "Fox & Friends" hosts, Trump repeated old claims
   that Democrats targeted his campaign since the beginning, expressing
   suspicion that the White House under former President Barack Obama was
   involved in those attempts.

   "You're dealing with the highest levels of government. They were spying
   on my campaign," said Trump.

   The president has alleged in the past that the Obama White House tapped
   the phones of Trump campaign officials, without offering any evidence.
   The Justice Department is expected to issue a report on Dec. 9
   investigating how the FBI's probe into Russian election meddling began.

   Russia's meddling in the 2016 election remains a focus of the
   president, who has cast suspicion on the U.S. intelligence community's
   conclusions that Moscow alone was responsible. Instead, Trump continues
   to believe Ukraine was involved, and a Ukrainian company played a key
   role in holding a computer server with information from the
   presidential campaign of Hillary Clinton. He insisted in his interview
   Friday that he was pressing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy for
   information about that theory.

   "They have the server. I still want to see that server, the FBI still
   hasn't got that server. A Ukrainian company got that server. That's
   what that call (with Zelenskiy) was about. We're looking for
   corruption. I asked him very point blank because we're looking for
   corruption," Trump said.

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