Trump lawyer calls for end to Russia collusion investigation

WASHINGTON –– It’s time to end the investigation into whether President Donald Trump’s campaign colluded with Russians to interfere in the 2016 election, one of the president’s personal lawyers said Saturday.

The statement from John Dowd came the morning after Attorney General Jeff Sessions fired Andrew McCabe, a former top FBI official who is accused of making misleading statements during an internal review. McCabe had been a frequent target of Trump’s criticisms and claimed that his firing was another attempt to undermine the Russia investigation.

Dowd said he was speaking for himself, not the president, and said the investigation should be ended “on the merits in light of recent revelations.” He did not respond to another question asking about details of those revelations.

Although Dowd suggested that the Russia case was based on opposition research collected by a former British intelligence officer paid by Democrats during the campaign, Democrats and Republicans have concluded that wasn’t the trigger for the investigation. Instead, they said, it was a tip about George Papadopoulos, who was a foreign policy adviser to Trump’s campaign and later pleaded guilty to lying about his conversations with Russians.