So you’re back to my original comment. There was no gun in context of the conversation, you just believe that Trump was always threatening Comey, no matter the context of the specific conversation. Furthermore, your chain of events is not supported by the outcome. If Trump was giving Comey a direct order and Comey violated the chain of command in disobeying it, where is the punishment for his violation? Is your claim that Comey illegally disregarded a direct and lawful order and Trump didn’t do anything about it? For that matter, when did Trump ever claim the Flynn perjury case as reason for the firing? He didn’t, so tying this to his firing is unfounded.
Nothing happens in a vacuum and this is never truer than when it comes to relationships of any kind. Does your Mom have to tell you that she loves you every time you see her for you to feel loved by her? Comey states Trump attempted to “create a relationship of patronage”. Trump made it clear that he expected “loyalty” from Comey who was, at the time, a director of the FBI which is supposed to have independence from the executive branch. Trump made repeated statements about Comey’s job, even though Comey had already told him that he intended to stay on. Comey stated in his testimony that he believed he was fired due to the Russia investigation, of which, Flynn is a part. And we have Trump’s own words from the Lester Holt interview that this “Russia thing” was on his mind when he decided to fire Comey:
“When I decided to [fire Comey], I said to myself, I said you know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made up story.”
After this interview, Sarah Huckabee Sanders stated: “We want this [the Russia investigation] to come to its conclusion, we want it to come to its conclusion with integrity and we think that we’ve actually, by removing Director Comey, taken steps to make that happen.”
According to Comey, Trump aides did not have repeated contacts with Russian intelligence officials and Trump was never under investigation. All of these stories claim this in some regard, as do the other linked stories. They are incorrect if Comey is telling the truth. You can believe them or Comey, not both.
That’s not what Comey stated at all. Here is the direct testimony:
RISCH: I remember, you talked with us shortly after February 14th, when the “New York Times” wrote an article that suggested that the trump campaign was colluding with the Russians. Do you remember reading that article when it first came out?
COMEY: I do, it was about allegedly extensive electronic surveillance in their communications.
RISCH: Correct. That upset you to the point where you surveyed the intelligence community to see whether you were missing something in that. Is that correct?
COMEY: That’s correct. I want to be careful in open setting, but —
RISCH: I’m not going to go any further than that, so thank you. In addition to that, after that, you sought out both Republican and Democrat senators to tell them that, hey, I don’t know where this is coming from, but this is not the case. This is not factual. Do you recall that?
COMEY: Yes.
RISCH: Okay. So again, so the American people can understand this, that report by the New York Times was not true. Is that a fair statement?
COMEY: In the main, it was not true. And again, all of you know this. Maybe the American people don’t. The challenge, and I’m not picking on reporters about writing stories about classified information, is the people talking about it often don’t really know what’s going on, and going on are not talking about it. We don’t call the press to say, hey, you don’t that thing wrong about the sensitive topic. We have to leave it there.
I mentioned to the chairman the nonsense around what influenced me to make the July 5th statement. Nonsense. But I can’t go explaining how it is nonsense.
This testimony was about a specific New York Times article and Comey could not state what it was about the article he took issue with because it clearly had something to do with classified information. Again, I urge you to read the NYT article I linked to above which outlines what it may’ve been about the article that Comey disagreed with.
When did Session ever state a disagreement with the memo? Clinton broke the law and Comey broke protocol in clearing her. These are not mutually exclusive, no matter how hard you believe. But you are correct in one regard, false insinuation is the crux of her argument and the reason why she was widely mocked by both the left and the right.
Clinton didn’t break the law so Comey didn’t break protocol in clearing her. And I’d also like to state for the record that, since Clinton had to be investigated over this matter so should Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, Scott Walker, Rick Perry, Mitt Romney (who went so far as to, not only erase all of his emails, but also destroyed his computers after he left the Massachusetts’ governor’s office) be investigated for doing the same. And then there is Vice President Pence who had been using a private email account and the Trump administration who have been using a private server. Funny how I don’t hear any cries to have them investigated and locked up over it.
And yet again, you are misrepresenting what Rosenstein’s recommendation stated; I linked to his letter earlier, so you have no excuse for making incorrect statements about it. The gist of his recommendation is that Comey treated Clinton unfairly by making his initial announcement on July 5th and also when he openly announced that further emails were being looked at a week before the election. Sessions didn’t have to openly state disagreement with Rosenstein’s recommendation; we have his “lock her up” chants during the campaign. Clearly this is a man who never believed that Clinton was being treated unfairly during her investigation.
At any rate, this argument is getting circular, so I’ll let you have the last word here; it’s doubtful I’ll respond further unless I feel a strong urge to.
