Washington: The verbal war between former FBI Director James B. Comey and the president who fired him took a dramatic escalation Sunday, as Comey denounced President Trump as “morally unfit” and a “stain” on those around him and Trump suggested the former FBI chief should be imprisoned.
The role of Russia
Asked in the interview whether he thought Russia “has something” on Trump, Comey said: “I think it’s possible. I don’t know. These are more words I never thought I’d utter about a president of the United States, but it’s possible,” he told the interviewer, ABC anchor George Stephanopoulos. “It is stunning” that the possibility can’t be ruled out, “and I wish I wasn’t saying it, but it’s just — it’s the truth,” he said.
Comey said:
Comey said Trump asked him to investigate and disprove allegations contained in the so-called Steele dossier — a collection of allegations compiled in 2016 by Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence agent working for Trump’s political opponents. The dossier’s central allegation was that Russia was trying to interfere with the US election and assist Trump. The FBI had been reviewing it because it corroborated “totally separate information” that federal agents already had gathered, Comey said.
“It was coming from a credible source, someone with a track record, someone who was a credible and respected member of an allied intelligence service during his career. And so it was important that we try to understand it, and see what could we verify,” he said. Trump, however, was focused on one particular part of the dossier — the allegation that he had been compromised by Russian intelligence by consorting with prostitutes in a Moscow hotel in 2013.
Is Trump fit enough?
Asked about Trump’s mental condition, Comey said: “I don’t think he’s medically unfit to be president. I think he’s morally unfit to be president.” He likened Trump to a “forest fire” that threatens the norms of American democracy. “A person who sees moral equivalence in Charlottesville, who talks about and treats women like they’re pieces of meat, who lies constantly about matters big and small and insists the American people believe it — that person’s not fit to be president of the United States, on moral grounds,” Comey said. “The challenge of this president is that he will stain everyone around him.”
How did Trump react?
The interview is certain to escalate the president’s anger, which already had reached a high pitch Sunday, with a vicious series of tweets attacking the former FBI chief as “slippery” and a “slimeball.” Trump claimed that he “hardly even knew this guy.” He appeared to call for Comey’s imprisonment, declaring that Comey’s book did not explain why he “gave up Classified Information (jail), why did he lie to Congress (jail).” Trump offered no evidence that Comey has committed either of those offenses.
An obsessed president
In the interview, as in the book, Comey described Trump as obsessed with his own reputation — including allegations involving Moscow prostitutes -- and unconcerned with countering attacks from Russia. He also repeated his book’s description of Trump as “untethered” to truthfulness and its statement that Trump’s White House style reminded him of the mob. “The loyalty oaths, the boss as the dominant center of everything — it’s all about how do you serve the boss, what’s in the boss’ interests. It’s the family, the family, the family, the family.” When he first briefed Trump about the Russia investigation, Comey said, no one brought up how to stop the threat — only how to manage the public relations response. “No one, to my recollection, asked, ‘So what — what’s coming next from the Russians?’ “ he said.
The Clinton files
Democrats have also been angered by some of Comey’s conduct. Eleven days before the election, Comey departed from long-standing Justice Department protocol and sent a letter to Congress saying that the FBI had reopened an investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private server to handle her emails. Clinton and her allies have said Comey’s actions helped cost her the election. During the interview, Comey acknowledged that at the time, he was convinced Clinton would win, and that belief probably influenced his decision to write the letters.
Trump said:
“I don’t remember consciously thinking about that, but it must have been because I was operating in a world where Hillary Clinton was going to beat Donald Trump, and so I’m sure that it was a factor,” Comey said. “I don’t remember spelling it out, but it had to have been that she’s going to be elected president, and if I hide this from the American people, she’ll be illegitimate the moment she’s elected, the moment this comes out,” he added.
Was Comey arrogant?
Comey has come under rough criticism for his handling of the Clinton email case from both Democrats and Republicans, who say his decision to write the letters — and to go around his boss, then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch — provided evidence of a fatal arrogance. Comey said that he hoped he had made the right decision but that he could be wrong. “And so I think that’s my primary worry about myself, is an overconfidence that can lead to that — that pride, that closed-mindedness,” he said.