Trump Calls Report That He’s Questioning Pence Loyalty ‘Phony’

(Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trump denied a news report that he was questioning Vice President Mike Pence’s loyalty and said they had a strong bond.

“I can’t imagine any President having a better or closer relationship with their Vice President,” he said in a tweet Saturday. The New York Times report on Friday cited unidentified sources who said Trump was repeatedly asking aides and advisers about whether Pence was loyal.

“The New York Times did a phony story, as usual, about my relationship with @VP Mike Pence. They made up sources and refused to ask me, the only one that would know, for a quote,” Trump said in a separate tweet.

Asked about the story on Saturday while attending a summit in Papua New Guinea, Pence said he had a “good relationship” with the president.

“The president and I are very close,” Pence said. “I’ve been honored to serve as his vice president, honored when he asked me to run with him again.”

Pence said the report “came up” in his discussions with Trump, without providing more details.

“We had a good laugh and the president said to me ‘there are no anonymous sources that would say what that article said.’’’

To contact the reporters on this story: Toluse Olorunnipa in Washington at tolorunnipa@bloomberg.net;Tamara Thueringer in Washington at tthueringer@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Daniel Ten Kate at dtenkate@bloomberg.net, Edward Johnson, Kimberly Yuen

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