After Trump rips CNN, Comey tweets about freedom of press
Former FBI director James Comey’s latest tweet was a defense of the press — a quote from Thomas Jefferson’s Jan. 28, 1786 letter from Paris to physician James Currie.
“Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost,” Comey tweeted Saturday evening along with a picture of the Capitol.
Lifting a quote from a more than200-year-old letter that Jefferson had written to the doctor who treated Lucy Elizabeth Jefferson, his daughter, and tweeting it may seem random and innocuous on the surface, but its timing suggests otherwise.
Comey’s tweet was sent at 6:08 p.m. Saturday, about a half-hour after President Donald Trump attacked CNN International, the latest in his war against the mainstream news media.
“@FoxNews is MUCH more important in the United States than CNN, but outside of the U.S., CNN International is still a major source of (Fake) news, and they represent our Nation to the WORLD very poorly. The outside world does not see the truth from them!” Trump said on Twitter.
CNN’s public relations department fired back with a reply to Trump’s tweet several minutes later: “It’s not CNN’s job to represent the U.S. to the world. That’s yours. Our job is to report the news.”
Many, including some CNN reporters and analysts such as Christiane Amanpour and Jake Tapper, also did not sit silent, and criticized Trump for undermining the work of foreign correspondents in war zones around the world.
Comey has been somewhat active on the social media platform within the past month. To those who follow Comey’s semiregular Twitter activity, his tweets are subtle jabs at political leaders, particularly at the one who fired him.
During Trump’s trip to Asia two weeks ago, the president resurrected his attacks against Comey and called him a proven “liar” and “leaker.”
Hours later, Comey tweeted a sermon from the late English Baptist preacher Charles Haddon Spurgeon. It was about the difference between a truth and a lie.
“If you want truth to go around the world you must hire an express train to pull it; but if you want a lie to go around the world, it will fly; it is light as a feather and a breath will carry it,” Comey said.
The tweet included a picture of the Great Falls of the Potomac.