Trump warns ousted FBI director
Raises possibility of secret ‘tapes’ of their talks
WASHINGTON — Raging against a political firestorm, President Donald Trump on Friday shot a sharp warning at his ousted FBI director about possible “tapes” of their disputed private conversations, raising the provocative possibility that recording devices have been installed in the White House.
Mr. Trump’s top spokesman refused to comment on whether listening devices are active in the Oval Office or elsewhere, a non-denial that recalled the secretly taped conversations and telephone calls that ultimately led to former President Richard Nixon’s downfall in the Watergate scandal.
Mr. Trump’s warning to fired FBI Director James Comey prompted new accusations of interference in an investigation into allegations of collaboration between Russia and the Trump presidential campaign lastyear.
It also was seen as having escalated a potentially damaging standoff between a fuming, undisciplined president and the unorthodox lawman he dismissed three days earlier. Not to mention Congress, which is also investigating.
Democrats quickly seized on the dispute, demanding the White House turn over any tapes that might exist of the president’s conversations with Mr. Comey.
Mr. Trump’s behavior raises “the specter of possible intimidation and obstruction of justice,” wrote Reps. John Conyers and Elijah Cummings, ranking Democrats on the House Judiciary and Oversight committees, in a letter to
White House Counsel Don McGahn. “The president’s actions also risk undermining the ongoing criminal and counterintelligence investigations and the independence of federal law enforcement agencies.”
In an interview with Fox News on Friday, Mr. Trump declined to comment on whether he has listening devices in the White House.
“Well, that I can’t talk about. I won’t talk about that. All I want is for Comey to be honest. And I hope he will be,” Mr. Trump said.
For a president whose tweets frequently rattle Washington — and foreign capitals — Mr. Trump’s message early Friday was particularly jarring: “James Comey better hope that there are no ‘tapes’ of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press!” the president wrote.
The White House refusal to elaborate left open several questions: Had Mr. Trump been covertly taping conversations? Was he trying to intimidate Mr. Comey? Was he suggesting Mr. Comey had recordings? Or was it merely a button-pushing claim launched over frustration at news coverage of the controversy?
The tweet appeared to refer to a series of three conversations in which, Mr. Trump claims, Mr. Comey assured him he was not under FBI investigation as part of the bureau’s probe into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election. Mr. Comey has not explicitly denied the account. But sources close to him have cast doubt on the president’s account, noting it would be extraordinary for an FBI director to discuss an open investigation.
On Friday, a person close to the former director recounted a different version. At a one-on-one dinner at the White House in January, Mr. Trump asked Mr. Comey to pledge his loyalty to the president and Mr. Comey declined, instead offering to be honest with him, according to the person, who requested anonymity to discuss private conversations.
White House spokesman Sean Spicer denied that account.
The firing of Mr. Comey already has left Mr. Trump with the dubious distinction of being the first president since Nixon to dismiss a law enforcement official overseeing an investigation tied to the White House. He also, like Nixon, has grown increasingly isolated in the White House, according to several people close to Mr. Trump whospoke anonymously.
Mr. Trump was widely known to record some phone conversations at his office in Trump Tower during his business career.
Mr. Spicer, who largely dodged specific questions Friday about Mr. Trump’s meeting with Mr. Comey, said he was not aware that any recording of the Trump-Comey meeting exists. Associates of the former FBI director, who remained out of sight Friday at his suburban Virginia home, said they believed any tapes would validate Mr. Comey’s side of the story.
It was not clear when Mr. Comey would speak for himself.He declined an invitation to appear at a closed meeting of the Senate intelligence committee next week.
The face-to-face meeting between the president and the director raised other concerns. It came just days after the FBI interviewed Mr. Trump’s then-National Security Adviser Mike Flynn about his conversations with the Russian ambassador and a day after acting Attorney General Sally Yates first alerted the White House that she believed Mr. Flynn had lied about the conversations and could be blackmailed by Moscow.
Mr. Trump, in an NBC interview Thursday, said that he had been intending to fire Mr. Comey — whom he derided as a “showboat” and “grandstander” — for months and that it had nothing to do with the Russia investigation. But he also said, “In fact when I decided to just do it, I said to myself, I said you know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story, it’s an excuse by the Democrats for having lost an election that they shouldhave won.”
White House officials said Mr. Trump is considering nearly a dozen candidates to replace Mr. Comey, including Texas Sen. John Cornyn, South Carolina Rep. Trey Gowdy, former Michigan Rep. Mike Rogers and former New York City Police Commissioner Ray Kelly. Four candidates — Mr. Cornyn, acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe, attorney Alice Fisher and Judge Michael Garcia — have interviews scheduled Saturday.
Letter addresses taxes
Lawyers for Mr. Trump said Friday that a review of his past 10 years of tax returns did not reflect “any income of any type from Russian sources,” but the letter included exceptions related to previously cited income generated from a beauty pageant and sale of a Florida estate.
The letter represented the latest attempt by the president to tamp down concerns about any Russian ties amid an ongoing investigation of his campaign’s associates and Russia’s meddling in the 2016election.
The attorneys did not release copies of Mr. Trump’s tax returns. Their review also notably takes into account only Mr. Trump’s returns fromthe past 10 years.
NASA: No can do
When NASA launches its new big rocket for the first time — more than a year and a half from now, at the earliest — there will be no astronauts along for the ride.
In February, at the request of the Trump administration, NASA began studying whether it was possible to add crew for the first flight of its Space Launch System, a heavy-lift rocket under development for deep space missions.
On Friday, the space agency said the additional cost, time and risks outweighed the benefits.