President Trump on Sunday told a group of reporters that he is not a racist. In fact, he is the "least racist person you have ever interviewed," he said, before heading to dinner at his Trump International Golf Club in Palm Beach.

The statement followed several days of uproar in response to a report that Trump called Haiti, El Salvador, and African nations "shitholes" during a Thursday meeting on immigration policy. Trump has denied he made the comment, though the White House has not.

Also on Sunday, a handful of Republican leaders, including Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.), Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, insisted Trump did not use that word. "Did you see what various senators in the room said about my comments?" Trump asked, according to The Associated Press. "They weren't made."

The controversy comes at a tense time: Lawmakers are scrambling to pull together a spending deal this week to avoid a looming government shutdown on Saturday. Immigration remains one of the stickiest issues in this debate, with Democrats hoping to use the deal to protect from deportation hundreds of thousands of "DREAMers" brought to the U.S. illegally as children, in exchange for border security funds. The talks stalled after Trump's reported vulgar remarks. Trump on Saturday blamed the impasse on Democrats, saying they are "all talk and no action."

This isn't the first time Trump has vehemently denied any racist tendencies. During a news conference last year, he called himself "the least anti-Semitic person that you've ever seen in your entire life." Jessica Hullinger

After participating in a yearlong clinical trial about peanut allergies, two-thirds of the young participants are now able to ingest the equivalent of two peanuts a day without any adverse reactions.

The results of the study were announced Sunday during the American College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology conference in Seattle. The oral immunotherapy regimen did not work for all participants — 20 percent of the children involved had to leave the trial — and is not a cure for peanut allergies, but does aim to reduce sensitivity to peanuts, so a child that accidentally comes into contact with one does not suffer a major reaction.

For six months, 372 participating children, under medical supervision, were slowly exposed to peanut protein, starting with the smallest of doses and taking more as their tolerance increased. They then went through an additional six months of maintenance therapy. Two-thirds of the participants were able to ingest 600 milligrams or more of peanut protein, the equivalent of two peanuts, without developing any symptoms of an allergy. Of the 124 children given placebo powder, just four percent could consume that amount without having a reaction.

Peanut allergies affect 1 in every 50 American children, causing more deaths from anaphylaxis than any other food allergy, The New York Times reports. The treatment is being developed by Aimmune Therapeutics, with the study set to be published Thursday in The New England Journal of Medicine. Catherine Garcia

Following the recent Senate race recount, the elections supervisor of Broward County, Florida, has submitted her resignation letter, The Sun-Sentinel reports.

Brenda Snipes has spent 15 years as the supervisor of elections, and during the election earlier this month, faced criticism from Republican Gov. Rick Scott for taking longer than other counties to finish the initial counting of ballots. Scott was the GOP candidate against incumbent Sen. Bill Nelson, and without providing any evidence, wanted the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to investigate what "may be rampant voter fraud" in the county.

After counting the ballots, Scott had a lead of about 12,000 votes over Nelson, which triggered by law a recount. After a machine recount and then a hand recount that was ordered Thursday, the final vote tallies were submitted to the state on Sunday, and Nelson conceded. The Sun-Sentinel reports that Broward County made many errors after Election Day, including losing 2,040 ballots between the initial count and the recount and not updating results as frequently as the law requires.

Snipes has been criticized during previous elections as well for long lines and destroying ballots before being legally allowed to do so. Snipes did not respond to The Sun-Sentinel's request for comment, but Burnadette Norris-Weeks, counsel to the Supervisor of Elections Office, told the newspaper that she saw an early version of the resignation letter, and Snipes says she wants to spend more time with her family. She believes the resignation is effective Jan. 2, 2019. A Democrat, Snipes was appointed in 2003 by former Republican Gov. Jeb Bush, then elected in 2004. Catherine Garcia

On Sunday, firefighters continued to make progress against the Camp Fire in Northern California, the deadliest fire in state history, and the Woolsey Fire in Southern California.

The Camp Fire in Butte County has killed at least 76 people, scorched 149,500 acres, and destroyed 12,786 structures, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said Sunday. There are 1,276 people unaccounted for in the area. The fire is 60 percent contained.

The Woolsey Fire has burned 96,949 acres in Los Angeles and Ventura counties, destroying 1,130 structures and killing at least three people. The fire is 90 percent contained, with Cal Fire expecting full containment by Thursday.

About four inches of rain is forecast for Butte County late Tuesday through Friday, and close to two inches in Southern California later in the week, which will help both firefighters and air quality but increases the risk of mudslides in burn areas. Catherine Garcia

President Trump tried some new material out on Twitter Sunday, profanely twisting the name of one of his loudest critics, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.).

"So funny to see little Adam Schitt (D-CA) talking about the fact that Acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker was not approved by the Senate, but not mentioning the fact that Bob Mueller (who is highly conflicted) was not approved by the Senate!" Trump tweeted. Schiff, the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, responded with a tweet of his own: "Wow, Mr. President, that's a good one. Was that like your answers to Mr. Mueller's questions, or did you write this one yourself?"

Special Counsel Robert Mueller was appointed by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein last year, and did not require Senate confirmation. Schiff and others have argued that Whitaker's appointment was unconstitutional because he wasn't confirmed by the Senate, and never held a position in the Department of Justice that required Senate confirmation. Before accepting the position, Whitaker was a vocal opponent of Mueller's investigation into Russian meddling during the 2016 presidential election. Trump's legal team has been working on answering questions from Mueller, and on Friday, Trump claimed to have responded "very easily" to them.

Should Trump decide to backtrack from the tweet and insist that he misspelled Schiff's name on accident, it would only be his second biggest blunder of the weekend: on Saturday, while touring the fire-ravaged town of Paradise, California, he referred to it as "Pleasure," twice. Catherine Garcia

On Sunday, Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson of Florida conceded his re-election bid to Republican Rick Scott, the state's current governor.

Nelson spent four decades in politics, starting in the Florida state House, then going to space on the Space Shuttle Columbia as a congressman in 1986 before being elected to the U.S. Senate in 2000. Scott lead Nelson by about 12,000 votes after ballots were first counted, a margin so close that it triggered a mandatory recount. After a second machine recount was finished, a manual recount was ordered late last week, and by that time Scott's lead had dropped slightly to 10,033. There were almost 8.2 million votes cast.

This was the most expensive Senate race in Florida history, the Miami Herald reports, with Scott spending more than $50 million of his own money on his campaign. Catherine Garcia

"I think the evidence is overwhelming" that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) ordered the murder of U.S.-based Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) said on Face the Nation Sunday. "I don't think we can sweep this under the rug."

Paul reiterated his push to end U.S. arms sales to the Saudi government in retaliation for Khashoggi's killing, decrying the administration's plan to sanction other parties involved. "I think sanctions are pretending to do something without really doing anything," the senator said.

"Most of these people [being sanctioned] are in prison, other than the crown prince," Paul continued. "We need to punish who ordered this, who's in charge. ... If the president wants to act strongly, he should cut off the arm sales" over Khashoggi and because of civilian deaths in the U.S.-supported, Saudi-led intervention in Yemen's civil war.

President Trump continues to express skepticism that MBS is implicated in Khashoggi's death, and he suggested in an interview airing on Fox Sunday he might keep a close alliance with the Saudi prince even if he is guilty of the journalist's murder. He has repeatedly resisted calls to end weapons deals with Riyadh, claiming the economic toll on the United States would be too high.

Watch Paul's comments in context below. Bonnie Kristian