Donald Trump returns to White House, faces slew of challenges

New York: U.S. President Donald Trump is facing a barrage of challenges including Jared Kushner's role in the ongoing Russian probe, after coming back to the White House after his first international trip, during which he visited Saudi Arabia, Israel, Italy, the Vatican and Belgium over a period of nine days.

At home, Robert Mueller's appointment as special counsel is likely to alleviate pressure on the White House to respond to every development in the Russian probe involving President Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, which has grabbed headlines.

Reports have emerged that Trump's son-in-law and trusted aide Kushner proposed the idea of creating a secret communications channel between the Trump transition team and the Kremlin in a meeting with Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak at Trump Tower in December, which was also attended by former national security adviser Michael Flynn.

Reports are very damaging as Russian diplomatic facilities in the United States were used for the communications.

Ambassador Sergei Kislak told his superiors in Moscow that he and Kushner discussed ways to shield their pre-inauguration discussions from monitoring, the Washington Post said, citing officials briefed on intelligence reports.

The second issue will be Kushner's relationship with former national security adviser Michael Flynn.

The third matter of concern for the President is about the memo in which Trump asked Former FBI Director James Comey to end the FBI probe into ex-national security adviser Michael Flynn.

Robert Mueller, the former FBI director now overseeing the Department of Justice's investigation into the Trump team's connections with Russia in the 2016 elections has been briefed on the contents of the memos related to former FBI Director James Comey's conversations with President Donald Trump.Ex-FBI Director James Comey has shown his willingness to speak to the special counsel Mueller before testifying publicly.

Mueller's investigation is expected to focus on obstruction of justice and he is likely to question Comey as a witness in the probe. Now President Trump faces an unprecedented test in the form of a special counsel investigation. Mueller can prosecute anyone who lies to him.