Trump says he's leaving investigation of 2016 Russia probe to Barr

• Trump made the remarks to reporters a day after a person familiar with the matter said the department's review is now a criminal investigation.
• Mueller's investigation found that Moscow interfered in the 2016, election to help Trump's candidacy.

WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump said on Friday said he is entrusting his attorney general, William Barr, to handle the investigation into the origins of a Justice Department probe into Russian interference in the 2016, US presidential election, and that "I can't tell you what's happening.

Trump made the remarks to reporters a day after a person familiar with the matter said the department's review is now a criminal investigation.

Democrats and some former law enforcement officials have said Barr is using the power of the Justice Department to chase unsubstantiated conspiracy theories that could benefit the Republican president politically and undermine the findings of former Special Counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation.

"I can't tell you what's happening. I will tell you this: I think you're going to see a lot of really bad things," Trump said as he departed the White House.

"I leave it all up to the attorney general and I leave it all up to the people that are working with the attorney general who I don't know. But I will say this: I think you'll see things that nobody would have believed. This was the worst hoax in the history of our country," Trump added.

Barr appointed federal prosecutor John Durham to lead the review of whether US intelligence and law enforcement agencies acted properly when they examined possible ties between the Trump campaign and Russia, which ultimately led to the Mueller investigation.

Mueller's investigation found that Moscow interfered in the 2016, election to help Trump's candidacy, and led to criminal convictions of several former campaign aides. But Mueller concluded that he did not have sufficient evidence to establish a criminal conspiracy between Trump's campaign and Russia.