Trump never sat down with book author: WH

by Jordan Fabian - 01/03/18 3:48 PM ET

President Trump never sat down with author Michael Wolff for an interview as president for his explosive new book about Trump’s campaign and presidency, the White House said Wednesday.

Their only direct interaction was a five- to seven-minute phone call after Trump became president, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters.

Wolff’s “Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House” paints a chaotic picture of Trump and those around him. An excerpt of the book was published in New York Magazine on Wednesday.

The book dominated Sanders’s Wednesday afternoon briefing. {mosads}

Trump issued a statement shortly after excerpts leak slamming former White House chief strategist Stephen Bannon, who is purported to be one of the primary sources for the book. Trump’s scathing statement said that Bannon has “lost his mind” and claimed he had “no influence” in the White House.

“Steve Bannon has nothing to do with me or my presidency,” Trump said. “When he was fired, he not only lost his job, he lost his mind.”

Sanders said Wolff had roughly more than a dozen interactions with officials at the White House, noting that 95 of meetings were arranged at the request of Bannon.

Leaked excerpts from the book showed Bannon calling the 2016 Trump Tower meeting between a Russian lawyer and Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner, his son-in-law; and his campaign chairman Paul Manafort “treasonous” and “unpatriotic.”

During Wednesday’s briefing, Sanders pushed back and called it a “ridiculous accusation” and pointed to a previous interview where Bannon defended Trump from charges of Russian collusion.

Wolff claimed to have wide-ranging access for the book, conducting more than 200 interviews.

The author said he was able to take up “something like a semi-permanent seat on a couch in the West Wing” shortly after the inauguration at the urging of the president, according to a note published by New York Magazine along with the excerpt.