James Comey was confirmed as U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York in 2001. By 2003, he became Deputy Attorney General. After taking a few years off, away from governmental jobs, he was nominated was confirmed as FBI Director on July 29, 2013. His position was a ten-year term, however, on May 9, 2017, he received a termination letter from Trump, who claimed to the media, that his decision was based on the Russian investigation.

During the 2016 election, Comey made multiple public statements on the Hillary Clinton private email server investigation. Many in both parties disagreed with the actions of the FBI Director. Although Trump did not like to original outcome of the investigation, he did praise the director when he notified Congres that he was reopening the investigation last October. Although information came out about the Russians meddling in the 2016 election, it wasn’t until after the election, that we heard about the investigation into the Russia-Trump collusion. Most of the focus stayed on the Clinton investigation and WikiLeaks posting hacked emails from the Democratic Party. During a debate, Trump denied the allegations of Russias meddling in the election and also made a statement at a rally starting with “Russia if you’re listening…” It wasn’t until the Comey testified in front of the House Intel Committee that he confirmed the FBI was investigating Trump campaign.

After news came out about the Trump-Russia investigation, Trump tried to find out if Comey would be loyal to him. He asked him on multiple occasions if he liked and wanted to keep his job, implying that many would love to have his position. Although meetings between the director and president are not uncommon, the topics discussed were. Seven days after Trump was inaugurated, he almost demanded Comey to “prove [the Russian investigation] didn’t happen.” Three weeks later, he asked Comey to drop the Michael Flynn investigation, even though Flynn resigned the day before for misleading the vice president. Additional conversations came to light where Trump wanted to “left the cloud” of the Russian investigation, as it was interfering in his presidency. Comey did not comply with Trump’s requests but stated he would be honest and continue to move the investigation along. A month later, he was fired.

After Comey was fired, the letter Comey was sent and the statements from the  White House and President Trump did not match up. The letter stated that Trump was following the recommendations of the Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General, while in an interview, Trump said he knew he was going to fire Comey with or without the recommendations. Trump also admits that he let Comey go because of the Russian investigation. At the same time, the White House tries to pin the Comey firing on his mishandling of the Clinton investigation. Because of the misinformation about Comey and Trump, Comey leaked his unclassified memorandums on their communications to the press. Trump the took to Twitter threatening that Comey better hope there are no “tapes” of their conversations. In June, Comey testified in front of Senate Intel Committee where he provided further details on the strange communications.

  • July 2016 – After investigating Clinton’s use of a private server, Comey made a public statement from the FBI about not recommending charges be brought against her, but that her actions reckless.
  • October 2016 – During an investigation into Anthony Wiener’s computer, emails from Clinton were found. Comey then sent a letter about reopening the investigation into Clinton’s email server.
  • October 29, 2016 – Trump praised Comey for reopening the investigation into Clinton’s private email server.
  • November 7, 2016 – Comey made an unprecedented statement confirming his initial findings in the Clinton case.
  • January 6 – Trump and his national security team were briefed by the Intelligence Community on Russians interference in the 2016 election. After the briefing, Comey and Trump spoke about sensitive information regarding the Russian investigation.
  • January 27 – Trump invited Comey over for dinner that night without information on who else would be joining them. It turned out to be only Trump and Comey in the Green Room, where Trump again asked Comey if he wanted to stay on as FBI Director. Comey was concerned that the meeting was to “create some sort of patronage relationship,” especially after Trump said, “I need loyalty, I expect loyalty.” The President also brought up the Russian investigation where he considered ordering Comey to “prove it didn’t happen.”
  • February 13 – Michael Flynn stepped down as National Security Advisor when a leak came out about him misleading the Vice President on his conversations with the Russians and Russian sanctions.
  • February 14 – After a scheduled counterterrorism briefing with the President and the Intel Community, Trump made it clear that he wanted to speak with Comey alone. Once everyone left, Trump started the conversation saying “I want to talk about Mike Flynn.” From there, he pleads to drop the Flynn investigation because he is a good person and did nothing wrong.
  • March 2017 – Comey testified in front of the House Intelligence Committee confirming the Trump Campaigns
  • March 30 – Trump called Comey to ask him to “lift the cloud” on the investigation.
  • April 11 – Comey had his last conversation with Trump before being fired. Trump  “asked what I had done about his request that I ‘get out’ that he is not personally under investigation. I replied that I had passed his request to the Acting Deputy Attorney General, but I had not heard back. He replied that ‘the cloud’ was getting in the way of his ability to do his job . . . “He said he would do that and added, ‘Because I have been very loyal to you, very loyal; we had that thing you know.’ I did not reply or ask him what he meant by ‘that thing.’ I said only that the way to handle it was to have the White House Counsel call the Acting Deputy Attorney General. He said that was what he would do and the call ended.”
  • May 9, 2017 – Comey was fired by Trump. In the letter, Trump thanked Comey for letting him know that he was not under investigation three times.
  • New York Times reported that Trump asked Comey to “shut down” the investigation into Michael Flynn.
  • Memorandums Comey kept regarding meetings he had with the President were leaked to the press.
  • May 12, 2017 – Trump tweeted a threat towards Comey saying he better hope there are no “tapes” of the conversations they had. Yet, there is no evidence of recordings.

  • Trump admitted in a TV interview, that he fired Comey because of the Russian investigation.
  • May 2017 – The Senate Intel Committee requested Comey testify to the conversations he has with the President.
  • June 8, 2017 – Comey testified in front of Senate Intel Committee in which he stated that he has no doubt that the Russians interfered in the 2016 election.

Sources

  • http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/07/politics/james-comey-memos-testimony/index.html
  • https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/08/us/politics/senate-hearing-transcript.html
  • http://www.factcheck.org/2017/06/the-comey-hearing/
  • http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/08/politics/james-comey-testimony-donald-trump/index.html
  • https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/08/us/politics/james-comey-new-york-times-article-russia.html
  • http://www.cnbc.com/2017/06/13/jeff-sessions-testifies-on-james-comey-firing-and-russia-probe.html
  • http://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/08/full-text-james-comey-trump-russia-testimony-239295
  • http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/07/politics/who-is-james-comey-fbi-director-things-to-know/index.html
  • https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-russia-idUSKBN18Z0HC

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