Newt Gingrich says 'bombshell reports' about Trump are 'garbage

A very combative Newt Gingrich assailed the reputations of the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal over their bombshell reports that have landed squarely on the Trump campaign for a week. He made the comments Friday on Fox News.

"They're garbage," he said. "The fact that this city is fascinated with garbage is a sad commentary. I'm with General Keene. Here you have a president going to a historic meeting with over twenty Arab leaders, but the story is no sources, no names, in either the New York Times, or the Washington Post, none."

"And yet these are 'bombshells.' No they're not," he said. "They're just more of the left-wing hatred for [President] Trump."

"Trump was clear on CBS News," he continued, "he told Lester Holt, he wanted to fire Comey. He thinks Comey was irresponsible. Y'know, now you have a leak that says, 'gosh, Trump actually meant what he said on CBS.' This stuff is just - all of this is done by the left."

"There's a Harvard study out that shows there's more media hostility to Donald Trump than any president in modern American history," Gingrich added, "tonight's another example. They could have said, 'president leaves on historic trip to bring together the Arab world to fight terrorism.' President leaves on historic trip to go to Israel and meet with both Palestinians and Jewish leaders. President goes on historic trip to meet the Pope. Oh no! They come up with garbage in order to smear the president as he leaves the country."

"I think it's disgusting, and I think it's really sad that the Washington Post and the New York Times have ceased to be newspapers and purely become left-wing propaganda instruments."

Gingrich was also asked to opine on the highly anticipated testimony of former FBI Director James Comey, who was fired unceremoniously by Trump.

"Fine. Look I have a simple question for Comey," Gingrich responded. "If at any point, the president was doing anything inappropriate. He testified in public and said it wasn't true. I don't think he told his superiors, so what's the deal? Comey clearly didn't think he was pressured. He clearly didn't think it was inappropriate. But now that he's been fired, I mean, how many people have had somebody you fired turn around and decide they don't like you?"

"So if Comey had a beef," he reasoned, "didn't he have an obligation to tell the Congress? He appeared before Congress. He was asked questions. 'Has any effort been to stop this?' 'No there has not been effort.' Go back and look at what he said. And whatever he says when he testifies after Memorial Day I hope people will look at what he said earlier, put them together, and ask yourself how honest is this guy and how reliable is this guy?"

Comey had testified before Congress and asked if the Attorney General or senior officials at the State Department had ever asked him to halt an FBI investigation.

Some have taken his answer to include the possibility of the president asking him to halt an FBI investigation, while others say he was answering strictly according to the question asked. He responded, "Not in my experience. Because it would be a big deal to tell the FBI to stop doing something that — without an appropriate purpose. I mean where oftentimes they give us opinions that we don’t see a case there and so you ought to stop investing resources in it. But I’m talking about a situation where we were told to stop something for a political reason, that would be a very big deal. It’s not happened in my experience."

It was announced Friday that the former FBI director would be testifying before Congress publicly about the accusations after Labor Day.