Comey to back Trump on probe
Former FBI director to testify today before Congressional panel
Former FBI Director James Comey will testify that he informed President Donald Trump that he was not personally under investigation, validating the president’s previous claims that he was not the target of a probe into his campaign’s possible ties to Russia, according to prepared remarks released ahead of his appearance on Capitol Hill on Thursday.
Comey’s testimony will be his first public comments since Trump abruptly fired him on May 9. The sevenpage remarks released Wednesday reveal in dramatic detail, and with a writer’s flair, Comey’s uneasiness with Trump, who he believed was disregarding the FBI’s traditional independence from the White House.
Until his firing, Comey oversaw the federal investigation into possible collusion between Trump’s associates and Russia. Trump’s abrupt firing of Comey outraged Democrats, who believe he was improperly trying to halt a probe that has hung over his presidency since his first day in office.
The former director’s testimony is based on written memos of his interactions with Trump, some of which he says he shared with senior FBI leadership. Comey describes at length a Feb. 14 meeting in the Oval Office in which he believed Trump asked him to drop any investigation of fired National Security Adviser Michael Flynn’s contacts with Russia’s ambassador to the U.S.
“He then said, ‘I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go. He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go,’” Comey says, according to the prepared remarks. “I replied only that ‘he is a good guy.’”
White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said she was unsure if the president had reviewed Comey’s testimony.
Earlier Wednesday, Trump announced that he planned to nominate Christopher Wray, a former Justice Department official, as Comey’s successor. FBI directors are nominated for 10-year terms.
Comey’s testimony was released by the Senate intelligence committee hours after lawmakers sparred with top intelligence chiefs who declined to answer the panel’s questions about classified conversations they had with Trump regarding the Russia probe.
Trump allies have sought to undermine Comey’s credibility ahead of his testimony, noting that the FBI had to correct some of his remarks from his last appearance on Capitol Hill. They’ve also questioned why Comey did not raise his concerns about Trump publicly or resign.
According to Comey, Trump asked if he wanted to remain as FBI director and declared: “I need loyalty. I expect loyalty.” Comey says he replied that he could offer his honesty, and that when Trump said he wanted “honest loyalty,” Comey paused and said, “You will get that from me.”
In March, after Comey had publicly revealed the existence of a federal counterintelligence investigation into ties between Russia and the Trump campaign, Trump argued that the probe had left a cloud that was “impairing his ability to act on behalf of the country.”
Comey said his practice of keeping written meeting records began after his encounter with Trump before the inauguration. He said he did not keep records of the private, in-person interactions he had with President Barack Obama between the time he took the helm at the FBI in September 2013 and the end of the 44th president’s tenure.