White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Wednesday that President Donald Trump has not fired Attorney General Jeff Sessions because "you can be disappointed in someone but still want them to continue to do their job."
"I don't believe they've spoken this week," Sanders told reporters at the daily briefing, even as Sessions met with a key Justice Department committee Wednesday at the White House.
"The president wants the attorney general to focus on his duties as attorney general," Sanders said. "We've both spoken about that pretty extensively – and I don't have anything else to add."
Trump took to Twitter Wednesday to bash Sessions for the third time in as many days, asking why he did not terminate Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe.
The president said that McCabe was a friend of James Comey, whom Trump fired in May.
Trump has publicly slammed Sessions five times in the last week – beginning with an interview in The New York Times, in which he initially claimed that McCabe's wife "essentially" received a $700,000 campaign donation from Democrat Hillary Clinton.
When asked Wednesday why Trump doesn't fire Sessions himself, Sanders responded: "I made clear last week, if there comes a point he doesn't, he'll make that decision."
However, she beat back suggestions that the Trump-Sessions flap – along with news reports that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has grown frustrated in his job – has sapped morale at the White House.
"He empowers us to do our jobs – and I don't think it matters whether you're a Cabinet secretary, a low-level staffer, we're here to do a job," Sanders told reporters.
"He's asked us to do it and he expects us to get it done.
"I've spent a good bit of time with quite a few Cabinet secretaries over the last couple days, and morale is high."
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