Trump: No one can beat me in 2020 election

US President Donald Trump confirmed this weekend that he plans to run for election in 2020 but says he doesn’t expect a tough challenge given that, in his opinion, there is no one who could beat him.

Asked during an interview with the UK’s Mail on Sunday whether he planned to seek reelection, Trump said; “Well I fully intend to. It seems like everybody wants me to.”

“Do you see a Democrat who can possibly beat you?’ interviewer Piers Morgan, a friend of the president, asked.

“No. I don’t see anybody. I know them all and I don’t see anybody,’ Trump responded. “They do not have the right candidate.”

The interview, which was conducted on Friday, came in the middle of a tumultuous visit to the UK as part of a broader trip to Europe and Russia.

Trump has spent the week-long trip wreaking havoc in Europe, first at a NATO summit in Brussels where he questioned the value of the decades-old alliance, and later in Britain, where he faced fallout from a stunning newspaper interview in which he undermined British Prime Minister Theresa May at an especially vulnerable time.

In his Mail interview, he appeared to breach protocol again by disclosing details of a conversation he had with Queen Elizabeth on Thursday.

Asked if he discussed Brexit with the Queen, Trump said: “I did. She said it’s a very – and she’s right – it’s a very complex problem, I think nobody had any idea how complex that was going to be… Everyone thought it was going to be ‘Oh it’s simple, we join or don’t join, or let’s see what happens.’”

He went on to say that she was “an incredible woman. She is so sharp, she is so beautiful, when I say beautiful – inside and out. That is a beautiful woman.”

Two days before a high-stakes summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Trump played golf and tweeted Saturday from one of his namesake resorts, blaming his predecessor for Russian election meddling and lashing out at the free press from foreign soil.

Aides had said Trump would spend the weekend preparing to meet Putin on Monday in Helsinki, but the tweets showed other topics were on his mind.

“I have arrived in Scotland and will be at Trump Turnberry for two days of meetings, calls and hopefully, some golf – my primary form of exercise!” he tweeted early Saturday, referencing his seaside golf resort. “The weather is beautiful, and this place is incredible! Tomorrow I go to Helsinki for a Monday meeting with Vladimir Putin.”

I have arrived in Scotland and will be at Trump Turnberry for two days of meetings, calls and hopefully, some golf – my primary form of exercise! The weather is beautiful, and this place is incredible! Tomorrow I go to Helsinki for a Monday meeting with Vladimir Putin.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 14, 2018

Trump was later seen playing the Turnberry links, several holes of which are visible from a nearby beach, where dozens of people staged a protest picnic Saturday. He was videotaped waving at protesters as they shouted “No Trump, No KKK, No Racist USA!” before resuming his game. He was also seen posing for photos.

A line of police, some on horseback, stood between the course and protesters. Snipers perched atop a nearby tower overlooking the vast property.

The protesters were among the thousands who came out in Scotland and England in opposition to the US president’s visit to both countries.

Some 10,000 people marched Saturday through the Scottish capital of Edinburgh, while police searched for a paraglider who breached a no-fly zone and flew a protest banner over the resort in western Scotland where Trump and his wife, Melania, are staying through Sunday.

The glider carried a banner that said “Trump: Well Below Par” over the resort Friday night to protest his environmental and immigration policies.

In Edinburgh, anti-fascist groups and political activists joined those who said they’d never protested before, weaving through the capital’s streets waving an array of makeshift anti-Trump banners. A choir, a bagpiper, a tambourine band and poetry readings added to the carnival spirit.

“Donald Trump is not welcome here,” Scottish Labour leader Richard Leonard told the crowd. “The horrific scenes at the Mexican border are just the latest example of his repudiation of decent human values.”

Protesters also launched a 20-foot-tall (6-meter) blimp depicting Trump as an angry baby that had flown over anti-Trump protests in London on Friday.

Despite the protests, Trump was keeping tabs on domestic issues back in the US, including the investigations into Russian election meddling.

In Saturday’s tweets, Trump tried to blame former president Barack Obama for failing to stop the Russians from working to help him win the 2016 election.

“The stories you heard about the 12 Russians yesterday took place during the Obama Administration, not the Trump Administration,” Trump tweeted, asking why they didn’t “do something about it, especially when it was reported that President Obama was informed by the FBI in September, before the Election?”

The stories you heard about the 12 Russians yesterday took place during the Obama Administration, not the Trump Administration. Why didn’t they do something about it, especially when it was reported that President Obama was informed by the FBI in September, before the Election?

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 14, 2018

It was Trump’s first response to indictments announced Friday in Washington against 12 Russian military intelligence officers who allegedly hacked into the presidential campaign of Hillary Clinton, Trump’s Democratic rival, and the Democratic Party, and released tens of thousands of emails in a sweeping Kremlin conspiracy to help Trump.

Trump denies that he or any campaign aides were involved with the Russian campaign and repeatedly dismisses the ongoing investigation that produced Friday’s indictments as a “witch hunt.”

Trump told reporters he plans to raise election meddling with Putin but said he doesn’t expect Putin to ever accept blame.

“I will absolutely bring that up. I don’t think you’ll have any ‘Gee, I did it. I did it. You got me,'” Trump said Friday, referring to Putin.

Leading Democratic senators asked Trump in a letter Saturday to scrap the summit if he was not prepared “to make Russia’s attack on our election the top issue you will discuss.” And John McCain, a leading Republican senator and Trump critic, said Trump must hold Putin accountable or not proceed with the meeting.

But Trump’s chief diplomat, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, told journalists traveling with him that he was confident the meeting would “put America in a better place.”