Donald Trump stands with Saudi Arabia despite Jamal Khashoggi killing

Trump's statement came only days after the CIA concluded that the crown prince had authorised the killing of Khashoggi

US President Donald Trump defied the nation’s intelligence agencies and a growing body of evidence to declare his unswerving loyalty to Saudi Arabia, asserting that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s culpability for the killing of Jamal Khashoggi might never be known.

In a remarkable statement, the president said, “It could very well be that the crown prince had knowledge of this tragic event — maybe he did and maybe he didn’t!”

“We may never know all of the facts surrounding the murder of Jamal Khashoggi,” Trump added. “In any case, our relationship is with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.”

His statement, which aides said Trump dictated himself and reflected his views, came only days after the CIA concluded that the crown prince had authorised the killing of Khashoggi, a Saudi journalist and columnist for WSJ.

In 633 words, punctuated by eight exclamation points and written in an impolitic style that sounded like Trump’s off-the-cuff observations, the statement was a stark distillation of the Trump worldview: Remorselessly transactional, heedless of the facts, determined to put America’s interests first, and founded on a theory of moral equivalence.