- President Donald Trump bragged that he protected Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman after the assassination and dismembering of the Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi in October 2018.
- “I saved his ass,” Trump had said amid the US outcry over Khashoggi’s killing, according to Bob Woodward’s new book. “I was able to get Congress to leave him alone. I was able to get them to stop.”
- The president told Woodward he didn’t believe that MBS ordered Khashoggi’s murder, though the US and other foreign intelligence services concluded that he did order the attack.
- After Khashoggi’s murder, Trump bypassed Congress to sell roughly $8 billion in arms to the Saudis and the United Arab Emirates. He vetoed a trio of resolutions blocking the sale, as well as a resolution to end US support for the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen.
By Sonam Sheth and John Haltiwanger | 10 September 2020
BUSINESS INSIDER — President Donald Trump bragged that he protected Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman from congressional scrutiny after the brutal assassination of the American journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
That’s according to the veteran reporter Bob Woodward’s upcoming book, “Rage,” set to be released next Tuesday. Insider obtained a copy of the book.
Woodward conducted 17 wide-ranging interviews with the president for the book, as well as interviews with multiple senior White House officials and former administration officials. Still, Trump last month slammed the book as “a FAKE, as always, just as many of the others have been.”
Woodward wrote that Trump called him on January 22 shortly after attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. During the conversation, Woodward pressed the president about Khashoggi’s gruesome murder. […]
Hmm. Was Khasshogi even really murdered? Evidence? Otherwise, shut the hell up.