Posted on 04/11/2018 1:51:24 PM PDT by MarvinStinson
Former FBI Director James Comey's promised openness is particularly tantalizing for some congressional investigators who have been trying unsuccessfully to get Comey to answer questions in the months since he was fired.
Fired FBI Director James Comey's bookselling campaign is well under way. ABC is leaking sensational tidbits from a five-hour interview Comey did with George Stephanopoulos, set to air in a prime-time special Sunday. A commercial for the show features Stephanopoulos revealing that Comey compared President Trump to a "mob boss."
A "source present at the taping" told Axios that the interview "left people in the room stunned — [Comey] told George things that he's never said before." Just to make sure everyone is sufficiently teased, Axios reported that, "If anyone wonders if Comey will go there, he goes there."
Amid all the tantalizing promotional material, one line in the Axios report stood out. "Comey answered every question." Among the questions featured in the Stephanopoulos commercial: "Are there things that you know but haven't said that could damage to President Trump?" and "Was President Trump obstructing justice?"
Comey's promised openness is particularly tantalizing for some congressional investigators who have been trying unsuccessfully to get Comey to answer questions in the months since he was fired. The FBI has treated the Comey memos as if they are classified at the super-duper highest levels — they're not, with some not being classified at all — and forbidden note-taking by the few lawmakers who have been allowed to see them. And as far as Comey sitting down with, say, the Senate Judiciary Committee as it investigates aspects of the Trump-Russia affair? Forget it.
On May 17, 2017, after Comey was fired, the Judiciary Committee asked him to testify about the circumstances of his firing and his dealings with the Trump and Obama administrations in the Trump-Russia and Clinton email investigations. Comey declined. (He agreed to just one session, with the Senate Intelligence Committee, which had different sorts of questions.)
On May 26, the Senate Judiciary Committee's top two Republicans and top two Democrats — Chairman Chuck Grassley, ranking minority Dianne Feinstein, plus Lindsey Graham and Sheldon Whitehouse — wrote Comey again. "Given our role in considering the nomination of the next FBI director, the still unanswered questions from your last oversight hearing, and our role in oversight of the Justice Department and the FBI, your testimony will be essential to our constitutional duties," they wrote. Specifically, the lawmakers wanted to know as much as they could find out about Comey's memos.
On June 1, Comey sent a brief response. "I have received the letter," he wrote the committee. "As a private citizen now, I respectfully decline to answer the questions. Wishing you the best, Jim Comey."
Comey has not exchanged a word, spoken or written, with the committee since then.
Comey has, of course, since written a book, "A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership," which he will be promoting in the Stephanopoulos interview and in talks with Stephen Colbert, "The View," Rachel Maddow, the New Yorker's David Remnick, and Axios' Mike Allen.
"Mr. President, the American people will hear my story very soon," Comey tweeted on March 17. "And they can judge for themselves who is honorable and who is not."
As for lawmakers, particularly those on the congressional committee most responsible for overseeing the FBI when Comey was its chief, it would have been nice to hear Comey's story before he had something to sell.
Interesting that he is totally disqualifying himself as a witness for the special prosecutor investigation. No one could possibly justify his bias and public misbehavior.
Very true.
Very evil, biased and corrupt guy who thinks that trying to blend in with the curtains was appropriate behavior for the FBI director. Does calling the president a mob boss make him one? Uh no. Who’s in this mob, Jared, Melania, Ivanka? Crazy talk by a fired jerk.
Lying in a book or on TV is not illegal. The Clintons showed everyone how this could be done. The few times one of them was under oath, they seldom recalled very much.
Seems that I recall that you can’t claim the 5th, if you have already talked about matters such as these in public.
Perhaps I’m twisting the meaning of what I read some years ago, but there was something like this out there for a while.
It’s long past time to take the profit out of sedition.
Because I don’t think anyone in Congress really wants to know the truth or, they don’t want us to know the truth.
On another thread I commented that Comey refused to talk about certain things when he testified to Congress, because of on-going investigations. So how, as a civilian, can he now talk about those same investigations?
Because he’d be under oath.
It is interesting that the FBI and the Justice Department refuse to turn over documents that have been legally requested and that they are legally bound to supply.
On the other hand, the FBI raids Cohen’s office on a fishing expedition concerning documents that he was not legally required to supply.
When is someone going to finally confront the American KGB?
One of those scenarios has him talking under oath...
All the news media questions try to damaging Trump.
He is willing to answer those. He is not willing to answer questions with answers damaging to Hillary or Obama because that is where his illegal acts were committed.
Congress is but a shadow of the Framers’ intended institution.
Since the legislative power is the essence of republics, the American republic shall go as congress goes.
Yikes.
Mueller has prosecutors who have contributed cash to the Dems and spouted visceral hatred towards Trump. Andrew Weissman congratulated Sally Yates for her insubordination to Trump.
The whole thing is perverted. They are all doing goon work for the Dems.
Trump should start pardoning people, just to stir the pot.
Because he can say anything when he is selling his book, but when under oath he must tell the truth.. Or should tell the truth..
Is it possible Comey has received immunity by Mueller already. It was doled out to nearly everyone in the Email investigation for no return. No wonder Comey feels invincible
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