"I think it's very hard to impeach you when they have absolutely nothing", Trump said. "That was a total phony deal", Trump said.

The impeachment inquiry heard Ms Yovanovitch, who was recalled as U.S. ambassador in May, was sacked amid a smear campaign carried out by the President's personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani.

Trump reiterated "there was no quid pro quo", contradicting testimony by multiple impeachment witnesses.

The president repeated his claim one day after Fiona Hill, a former Russian Federation adviser on the White House National Security Council, admonished Republicans for pushing unsubstantiated conspiracy theories about Ukrainian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

The broader conspiracy of Ukraine election interference Trump hints at in his interview purports that the Democratic Party orchestrated, with that nation's help, the hacking of their own systems and framed Russian Federation in order to discredit a Trump presidency.

TRUMP: "A lot of it had to do, they say, with Ukraine".

That debunked theory, often dubbed CrowdStrike after the main security company involved, bolsters Trump's counter narrative and helps to justify his interest in Ukraine.

When Trump says the "FBI has never gotten that server", he is referring to the fact that the Federal Bureau of Investigation did not receive physical servers from the Democratic National Committee after its emails were hacked in the 2016 campaign.

During the hearings, current and former White House officials and diplomats voiced alarm at Giuliani's activities such as trying to push Ukraine to carry out two investigations that could harm Trump's political adversaries.

Ominously for both Giuliani and Trump, Parnas has vowed to spill the beans about the operation, although it remains to be seen if he will testify to the impeachment committee or cooperate with prosecutors.

'I want the whistleblower who put in a false report to testify, ' said Trump, who also went off on response the inspector general for the Intelligence Community, who provided information to Congress.

In the Senate, numerous next steps will depend on Mr Trump, whose shifting views have forced GOP senators to readjust their own.

Bolton is among the various USA officials described as being alarmed at Giuliani's actions, including pushing Ukraine to conduct two investigations that could harm Trump's political adversaries.

Fox host Brian Kilmeade repeatedly tried to get Trump to explain why he wanted a trial, only to have Trump veer into attacks on Democrats. "He was the greatest mayor in the history of NY and he was the greatest crime fighter probably in the last 50 years". "He is a great person, an iconic figure in this country".

Polls show American voters believe Biden would have the best shot at defeating Trump.

(L to R) Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and US President Donald Trump.

US intelligence agencies and former Special Counsel Robert Mueller determined that Russian Federation used a campaign of propaganda and hacking to interfere in the election to try to help Trump win.

Testimony in the impeachment inquiry has shown that Trump in May instructed top United States officials to work with Giuliani on Ukraine policy. He would continue to refer to the false narrative in other interviews that the firm was owned by Ukrainians or based there, despite the fact that it is a US company based in Sunnyvale, Calif., with no known ties to Ukraine. He said that that is why European countries should be more active in helping Ukraine. "Are we going to be sending massive amounts of money to a country and they're corrupt and they steal the money and it goes into everybody's bank account?"

There is no evidence to back up the assertion, but Trump nonetheless repeated it on Fox, saying "you have to say Joe Biden is corrupt". Its score of 32 out of 100 on the index, which is widely used by companies when deciding where to do business, indicates Ukraine has serious corruption issues.

Trump said that among the witnesses he would like to hear from in a Senate trial would be the whistleblower from within the intelligence community whose complaint about Trump's call to the Ukrainian president triggered the impeachment inquiry, which was launched in September.

"If something this major can't shake the core of support that he has, then I don't see anything really able to do that".

Form for signing up for free newsletter.