U.S. President Donald Trump is extremely frustrated with his senior staff and communications team for allowing the firestorm surrounding Attorney General Jeff Sessions to steal his thunder in the wake of his address to Congress, according to CNN.
"Nobody has seen him that upset," CNN quoted a source as saying. The source added the feeling was the communications team allowed the Sessions news, which the administration deemed a nonstory, to overtake the narrative.
Sessions is being accused of misleading the Congress by failing to disclose pre-election meetings with the Russian ambassador to Washington Sergey Kislyak. Following the accusations Democrats had called for Sessions to resign.
It had emerged that Sessions spoke twice with the Russian ambassador to the United States during former's presidential campaign.
Sessions did not mention either meeting, during his confirmation hearings when he said he knew of no contacts between Trump surrogates and Russians. A Justice official said Sessions didn't mislead senators during his confirmation.
On Thursday, Sessions recused himself from any current or future investigations into ties between Russia and the Trump campaign.
More From This Section
Earlier there was furor over former national security advisor Michaely Flynn's Russia ties following which he had to resign.
Renewed focus on Russia is seen as a major letdown after Tuesday when top officials were riding high, congratulating one another on Trump's speech to Congress.
"The staff fumbled," Trump told the team for not being prepared when the Sessions story came out, according to another source.
The President was "hot" and exasperated Thursday night after Sessions' recusal, a source familiar with the situation said, considering it hasty and overkill.
The President is showing increasing flashes of anger over the performance of his senior staff and daily developments about Russia overshadowing his message, multiple people inside the White House and outside the administration told CNN.