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- Trump fires Comey.
- FBI Director James B. Comey has been fired by the White House — with the official justification being Comey’s handling of the FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails. A statement from the White House press secretary reads, “President Trump acted based on the clear recommendations of both Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and Attorney General Jeff Sessions.” [New York Times / Michael D. Shear, Matt Apuzzo]
- In a letter from Trump to Comey, also made public, Trump insisted that the firing is by no means, definitely not, in no way related to an investigation into his associates’ ties to Russia. “While I greatly appreciate you informing me, on three separate occasions, that I am not under investigation, I nevertheless concur with the judgment of the Department of Justice that you are not able to effectively lead the bureau,” he wrote. [Vox / German Lopez]
In his letter firing FBI Director James Comey, President Donald Trump managed to make the termination a little personal.
Check out the second paragraph (emphasis mine):It seems like Trump knew what the main criticism of Comey’s termination would be: The FBI has been investigating the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia, so it sure seems convenient for Trump that he’s managing to get rid of the director of that agency. In this letter, Trump is trying to not so subtly tell people the Russia investigation has nothing to do with the termination — because, hey, the FBI told Trump that it’s really not investigating him personally.So what reason has the Trump administration given for firing Comey? Emails!
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| Al Drago/The New York Times |
- Comey’s handling of the email investigation is an old story ... but the fallout has continued. On Monday, reports emerged that Comey had given inaccurate testimony to Congress last week. Comey said Clinton aide Huma Abedin forwarded “hundreds of thousands” of emails to her husband, Anthony Weiner, for him to print for her, some of which contained classified information. In reality, Abedin forwarded a few Clinton emails (it’s unclear whether these were classified or unclassified), and the rest ended up on Weiner’s laptop via backups of Abedin’s BlackBerry. [ProPublica / Peter Elkind]
- Apparently the FBI has been deliberating how to handle the incorrect statement Comey made since, and how to correct the record. This afternoon, the FBI sent a letter to Senate Judiciary Chair Chuck Grassley supplementing the Comey testimony, explaining how the emails actually got on Weiner’s computer. [Vox / Andrew Prokop]
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| Gabriella Demczuk for The New York Times |
- The full rationale for Comey’s firing — at least, the official version — comes from a memo written by Deputy AG Rosenstein. Rosenstein argued that the FBI’s credibility “suffered substantial damage,” writing, “I cannot defend the director’s handling of the conclusion of the investigation of Secretary Clinton’s emails, and I do not understand his refusal to accept the nearly universal judgment that he was mistaken.” [Washington Post / Devlin Barret]
- The immediate effect of all of this, at the very least, is that the FBI will need a new director. Which, Vox’s German Lopez writes, “also lets Trump put someone new in place who will oversee the ongoing investigation into his presidential campaign’s ties to Russia.” [Vox / German Lopez]
- But for an administration that fired their national security adviser long after they ostensibly should have, the Trump administration took the advice to fire Comey extremely promptly. And reports are already surfacing that Sessions was directed to come up with reasons to fire Comey last week — the emails are just a pretext. [NYT / Michael S. Schmidt]
- If true, that’s worrisome — not least because it would mean that Sessions, after recusing himself from the Trump/Russia investigation in March, then stepped in to fire one of the officials leading the investigation. That connection has led many Democrats — and a few Republicans — to call for a special prosecutor to look into Trump’s Russia ties, to make sure the Sessions-led Justice Department (and whoever leads the FBI next) doesn’t cover up what suddenly seems like a bigger scandal than it previously did. [CNBC / Christine Wang]
- Here is an explainer about Watergate. No, no reason. Why do you ask? [Vox / Dylan Matthews]
Updates and Reactions to F.B.I. Director Comey’s Firing.
Comey heard the news while giving a speech.
Mr. Comey was addressing a group of F.B.I. employees in Los Angeles when a television in the background flashed the news that he had been fired.
In response, Mr. Comey laughed, saying he thought it was a fairly funny prank.
Then his staff started scurrying around in the background and told Mr. Comey that he should step into a nearby office.....Shortly thereafter, a letter from Mr. Trump was delivered to the F.B.I.’s headquarters, just seven blocks from the White House.
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Among those calling for a Select Commission, Sen. John McCain. CreditGabriella Demczuk for The New York Times |
Calls mount for a special counsel.
Mr. Comey’s firing immediately fueled calls for an independent investigator or commission to look into Russia’s efforts to disrupt the election and any connections between Mr. Trump’s associates and the Russian government....Mr. Comey’s firing upended the politics of the investigation, and even Republicans were joining the call for independent inquiries.
Subpoenas are issued in Flynn case.
In a sign of the F.B.I.’s intense interest in Mr. Trump’s advisers, a grand jury in Virginia recently issued subpoenas for records related to the former White House national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn,... it was not clear whether the subpoenas,...were related to Mr. Comey’s firing.
Trump to meet Russian foreign minister.
In an instance of bizarre timing and optics, the White House announced late Tuesday night that Mr. Trump will meet in the Oval Office with Sergey V. Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, on Wednesday morning.
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| Andrew G. McCabe at a press conference in 2015. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images |
McCabe is acting director.
... deputy director Andrew McCabe assumed the position of acting director of the F.B.I.
The firing raised the specter of political interference by a sitting president in an existing investigation by the nation’s leading law enforcement agency, and it immediately ignited Democratic calls for an independent prosecutor to lead the Russia inquiry.
■ Mr. Trump’s decision drew instant comparisons to President Richard M. Nixon’s firing of the special prosecutor looking into the Watergate burglary that would eventually bring him down.
■ A memo recommending the dismissal, written by Rod Rosenstein, the deputy attorney general, focused on the continuing fallout from Mr. Comey’s handling of an F.B.I. inquiry into Mrs. Clinton’s use of a private email server as secretary of state. Here are some excerpts from the memo, with comments by The New York Times.
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| Deputy attorney general, Rod J. Rosenstein |
Just last week, Trump publicly accused Comey of giving Clinton “a free pass for many bad deeds’’ when he decided not to recommend criminal charges in the case.
Officials released a Tuesday memo from the deputy attorney general, Rod J. Rosenstein, laying out the rationale behind Comey’s dismissal and attributing it all to his handling of the Clinton case. Officials said Rosenstein began examining Comey’s conduct shortly after being sworn into office two weeks ago.
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Several current and former officials said the relationship between the White House and the FBI had been strained for months, in part because administration officials were pressuring Comey to more aggressively pursue leak investigations over disclosures that embarrassed the White House and raised questions about ties with Russia...Although the FBI is investigating disclosures of classified information, the bureau has resisted calls to prioritize leak investigations over the Russia matter, or probe matters that did not involve leaks of classified or otherwise sensitive information, the officials said.
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The Justice Department inspector general has been investigating how Comey and his top deputy handled the Clinton probe, though that investigation is expected to continue for months.