Ending guessing game, Trump admits there are no Comey tapes
washington — Ending a monthlong guessing game that he started with a cryptic tweet and that ensnared his administration in yet more controversy, President Donald Trump declared he never made and doesn’t have recordings of his private conversations with ousted former FBI Director James Comey,
“With all of the recently reported electronic surveillance, intercepts, unmasking and illegal leaking of information,” Trump tweeted on Thursday, he has “no idea” whether there are “tapes” or recordings of the two men’s conversations. But he proclaimed “I did not make, and do not have, any such recordings.”
That left open the possibility that recordings were made without his knowledge. But he largely appeared to close the saga that began in May, just days after he fired Comey, then the head of an investigation into Trump associates’ ties to Russian officials. Trump has disputed Comey’s version of a January dinner during which the director said the president had asked for a pledge of loyalty.
Trump responded at that time, via Twitter, that Comey “better hope that there are no ‘tapes’ of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press!”
That apparently angry missive triggered a series of consequences, each weightier than the last. Comey has suggested that the tweet prompted him to ask an associate to release damaging information to the media. The resulting news reports built pressure on a top Justice Department official to appoint an independent prosecutor to oversee the Russia investigation. That special counsel, former FBI Director Robert Mueller, is now investigating Trump’s own actions in a probe that could dog his presidency.
Trump showed concern about that situation as well, telling Fox News Channel that Mueller is “very, very good friends with Comey which is bothersome.” Trump suggested a motivation behind the tapes tweet.
“When he found out that I, you know, that there may be tapes out there, whether it’s governmental tapes or anything else, and who knows, I think his story may have changed,” Trump said. “I mean you’ll have to take a look at that, because then he has to tell what actually took place at the events.”—