On Friday, United States Special Counsel Robert Mueller submitted the long-awaited report of his probe into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Moscow during the 2016 elections.

The investigation has been a looming threat to the Trump presidency, with both the president and his team repeatedly insisting that there was “no collusion”. Now, apparently, Trump is so used to saying these words to the media that he is using them as a greeting.

On Wednesday, the president approached reporters outside the White House chanting “no collusion” without any prompt, instead of a normal greeting like “hi” or “hello”. In the interaction that followed the reporters did question him whether Mueller’s report, which was yet to be submitted at the time, should be released to the public.

“I don’t mind,” he said. “Let it come out, let people see it, that’s up to the attorney general ...and we’ll see what happens.” It is not known how much of the report, which was submitted to Attorney General Willam Barr, will be made public.