Trump begging Democrats for impeachment: Pelosi

US Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi has said that President Donald Trump is practically begging the Democrats to launch a “premature” impeachment so he can defuse the potential threat to his presidency. 

"There's no question: the White House is just crying out for impeachment. That's why he flipped yesterday, because he was just hoping," Pelosi told reporters in the Capitol on Thursday.

Trump stormed out of a meeting with US congressional Democrats on infrastructure spending on Wednesday.

Pelosi said Trump's temper tantrum at the meeting, where he reportedly shouted before storming out just minutes after it started, was aimed at triggering the Democrats into launching the impeachment.

However, Pelosi said the Democrats would neither abandon investigations against Trump because he is insisting so, nor would they yet launch formal impeachment proceedings against him as the move against the president was still “premature” and needed a finishing touch.

"We do believe that it is important to follow the facts, we believe that no one is above the law, including the president of the United States, and we believe the president of the United States is engaged in a cover up, " she said.

Pelosi is pursuing an aggressive series of investigations into potential administrative wrongdoing. Those probes include examinations of Russia's 2016 election meddling, as well as looking at instances of potential obstruction of justice by Trump as outlined in special counsel Robert Mueller's report.

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"I do not intend not to honor my oath of office, nor do my colleagues in the House of Representatives ... to protect and defend the Constitution," she said, adding that Trump's "cover-up" in regard to investigations related to Russia's meddling in the 2016 US elections was available in the public domain.

Pelosi has said that Trump's refusal to cooperate with the Democratic probes "could be impeachable." But she wants the investigations to continue, to see what more they find — and how the public reacts — before taking such a divisive step.

"It may take us to a place that is unavoidable, in terms of impeachment — or not," she said. "But we're not at that place."

Ten examples of possible obstruction have been outlined in special counsel Robert Mueller’s report after investigation into Russia’s alleged meddling in the 2016 presidential election.

Master of Distraction 

After angrily storming out of the meeting with Democrats at the White House, Trump told reporters in the Rose Garden that he did not take part in any "cover ups."

He later took to Twitter to accuse Pelosi of lying when she said he had a "temper tantrum" at the closed-door meeting with the Democrats.

Pelosi accused Trump of making "villainous" attempts to distract the US public from the problems he was creating for the nation, key issues he had left unattended or neglected, and promises to them that he had either not kept or simply broke, as well as the many scandals dogging his administration.

"He's a master of distraction. ... That's something he does well; to distract from problems that he has he tries to change the subject," she said.

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Pelosi said Trump had also been frustrated with a series of recent court cases that have come down in favor of the Democrats seeking information from the administration to guide their investigations.

"I think what really got to him was ... these court cases and the fact that the House Democratic Caucus is not on a path to impeachment, and that's where he wants us to be," she said. "And when he saw that that was not happening, that — again, with the cover-up, which he understands is true — just struck a chord."

The meeting had been planned three weeks ago following a decidedly more cordial sit-down between Trump and Democrats where he agreed to begin work on a massive $2 trillion infrastructure package with hopes of moving it this year.

The second meeting was scheduled with the idea that Trump would propose different ways to cover the enormous tab — offsets that have long been the highest barrier to a major infrastructure expansion.

Pelosi argued that Trump's threat not to work with Democrats on infrastructure — or anything else — until Democrats end their probes into his administration was made because he simply hadn't found the offsets he'd promised.

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"It's never been partisan; we don't want it to be partisan now," she said. "But I can only think that he wasn't up to the task of figuring out the difficult choices of how to cover the cost."

"We can walk and chew gum at the same time; I hope he can, too," Pelosi said, hinting that Trump was too stupid to to figure out budget issues linked to the infrastructure talks.

She wished Trump's family or staff would conduct an "intervention" with him.

Pelosi said she was open to having future meetings with Trump, on infrastructure and other issues. But she also said she's concerned about his very well-being.

"I actually, ardently pray for the president," she said.

In response to Pelosi's comments, Trump described himself an as "extremely stable genius." 

Trump took revenge on Pelosi by questioning her mental health saying she had "lost it".

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