On May 16, 2017, Comey woke abruptly at 2:00 a.m. with a sudden realization: if Trump really had tapes of their conversations, then independent proof existed that the president had not only asked for his loyalty but asked him to drop the Flynn investigation, too, both of which Trump had denied. Comey had assumed it would be his word against Trump’s, which is one reason he’d written the memos and put them in secure locations.
For the past week, Comey had been trying to get Trump out of his head. But Trump kept taunting him by tweeting. If those tapes really existed, someone had to get them. Comey couldn’t count on Rosenstein to make the demand. But a special counsel would, Comey reasoned. And if people knew about his memos, there would be more pressure to appoint a special counsel. Comey lay awake the rest of the night mapping out a strategy.
Later that morning, Comey contacted his friend and media go-between Daniel Richman, the Columbia law professor. He said he was emailing him a memo that he urgently “needed to get out.” Richman said he’d do it. He already knew the drill: he’d again contact Michael Schmidt at the Times.
Comey could, of course, simply have gone himself to Schmidt, or countless other reporters. It wasn’t because he was “leaking” and needed the protection of anonymity; there was no classified information in his memos. As a private citizen, he was free to describe a conversation with the president. But if Comey were the named source, he’d have the media camped at his driveway. As he later put it, it would be “like feeding seagulls at the beach.”
Soon after, Richman sent Comey a one-word text: “Done.”
That same day Schmidt had a sensational scoop: “President Trump asked the FBI director, James B. Comey, to shut down the federal investigation into Mr. Trump’s former national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn, in an Oval Office meeting in February, according to a memo Mr. Comey wrote shortly after the meeting.”
While the story said the Times didn’t have a copy of the memo, “one of Mr. Comey’s associates read parts of it to a Times reporter.”
“I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go,” Trump told Comey, according to the memo. “He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go.”
AS THE FUROR from the Times story raged, McCabe showed up that afternoon for his job interview at the White House. As he sat outside the Oval Office, he could hear Trump, Priebus, Spicer, and other staff members yelling over the sound of the television, where commentators were talking about nothing except the Comey memo. “Who leaked this? How did this get out?” McCabe overheard someone say.
The communications director, Hope Hicks, was sitting at a desk nearby. Should McCabe be hearing this? He offered to move. “No, no, you’re fine right there,” she said.
Hicks interrupted Trump to say the Iowa senator Charles Grassley was calling. An ardent Trump supporter, Grassley was one of McCabe’s fiercest critics in Congress. He’d seized on the campaign contributions issue to send a barrage of letters to the Justice Department complaining about McCabe.
Finally the group filed out, and McCabe went in. Trump was behind his desk as usual, and Priebus, Sessions, and McGahn had stayed behind. There was no sign of Rosenstein.
“I was just talking to Senator Grassley,” Trump said. “Boy, he’s no fan of yours.”
“I’m aware of that,” McCabe said, and mentioned, in what he thought was a lighthearted tone, the fourteen letters Grassley had sent to the Justice Department complaining about him.
McCabe’s irony was lost on the president. Trump launched into a long and detailed account of his electoral triumph in North Carolina. (Why, McCabe had no idea.) He returned to the theme that people in the FBI loved him: “Ninety percent love me.” (It had been 80 percent the last time.)
That gave McCabe an opening for something he’d wanted to say. He reminded Trump that he’d asked him whom he voted for, and “I didn’t give you a straight answer.” Trump indicated he should go on, and McCabe said, “I did not vote in the 2016 election. I have considered myself a Republican my whole life, and I have always voted for the Republican candidate for president, except in 2016.” Because of the ongoing investigations during the campaign, “I thought it would be inappropriate for me to cast a vote,” he explained.
Priebus and McGahn said nothing. The president narrowed his eyes, squinting, gazing at McCabe.
“So, we’re looking for a new director now, and here you are,” Trump finally said. “Isn’t that great? This is terrific for you. How do you feel about that?”
McCabe said he was honored and happy to be considered. He loved the FBI, and being director would be the ultimate way to serve. He mentioned Louis Freeh, the only former FBI agent to have served as director.
“Well, it’s great,” Trump went on. “I don’t know if you’re going to get it, but if you don’t, you’ll just go back to being a happy FBI guy, right?”
Trump rattled off the names of other people he was interviewing for the job. Then he ended the interview without having asked a question about how McCabe would run the bureau or what he perceived to be its biggest challenges. “This has been great,” Trump said dismissively. “And who knows? You might get it.”
One name Trump didn’t mention was Robert Mueller, although Mueller, too, was at the White House that day to meet with the president and McGahn. Mueller was there to “offer a perspective on the institution of the FBI,” Bannon recalled, and the White House had even thought of “beseeching” Mueller to return to head the FBI. But Mueller hadn’t shown any interest in his old job, and “he did not come in looking for the job,” Bannon said.
MCCABE WENT STRAIGHT from his White House interview to Capitol Hill, stopping en route to pick up Page and Baker. Rosenstein and his entourage came in their own SUV. Rosenstein called McGahn from the vehicle to break the news he was appointing a special counsel. He knew it was the last thing Trump wanted, but he told McGahn the White House should welcome the news.
While McCabe and Rosenstein were waiting in a room in the basement of the Capitol, the House Intelligence Committee chair, Devin Nunes, came in, even though he’d recused himself from the Russia investigation in April amid allegations he’d leaked classified information to the White House. “He’s not supposed to be here,” McCabe said, and Rosenstein went over to talk to him. When he returned, Rosenstein said Nunes had insisted he was staying. “I can’t force him to leave,” Rosenstein said. So much for the confidentiality of what was supposed to be a top secret proceeding, McCabe thought.
The remaining members of the Gang of Eight filed in with their staff members. McCabe and Rosenstein sat at the head of a long table. Chuck Schumer and the Democrats sat on one side of the table to their left (Nancy Pelosi didn’t attend but sent a staff member); Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, and the Republicans faced them across the table. McCabe had an outline in front of him. He’d already gone over what he’d say with Rosenstein.
McCabe summarized Operation Crossfire Hurricane, reminding them of what Comey had already briefed them on, including the original four subjects, Carter Page, Papadopoulos, Flynn, and Manafort. No one had any questions or comments.
Then McCabe said the FBI had added two case files to Crossfire Hurricane, both counterintelligence investigations. One was President Trump. The other was Attorney General Sessions.
No one said anything. Some Democrats shook their heads; the Republicans cast their gaze downward at the table.
McCabe went on, explaining the predicate acts in both cases—the firing of Comey and its implications, for Trump; and the false statement about Russian contacts, for Sessions.
No one raised any objections. No one suggested the FBI was overstepping any bounds. There was some nodding of heads, as if the reasoning made perfect sense. The Republicans looked resigned to the inevitable.
Paul Ryan was the only one who asked a question, about whether a counterintelligence investigation was also a criminal investigation. Yes, McCabe answered. The FBI was investigating both collusion with the Russians and obstruction; either or both could result in criminal charges.
Then Rosenstein stepped in and announced he’d appointed a special counsel. Everyone at the table seemed surprised. Rosenstein fielded mostly procedural questions, including how a special counsel could be removed.
It was all over in little more than half an hour.
ROSENSTEIN ISSUED A formal order that same day:
By virtue of the authority vested in me as Acting Attorney General, including 28 U.S.C. §§ 509, 510, and 515, in order to discharge my responsibility to provide supervision and management of the Department of Justice, and to ensure a full and thorough investigation of the Russian government’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election, I hereby order as follows: (a) Robert S. Mueller III is appointed to serve as Special Counsel for the United States Department of Justice. (b) The Special Counsel is authorized to conduct the investigation confirmed by then–FBI Director James B. Comey in testimony before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence on March 20, 2017, including: (i) any links and/or coordination between the Russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of President Donald Trump; and (ii) any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation; and (iii) any other matters within the scope of 28 C.F.R. § 600.4(a). (c) If the Special Counsel believes it is necessary and appropriate, the Special Counsel is authorized to prosecute federal crimes arising from the investigation of these matters.
Sessions was still in the Oval Office after interviewing candidates for FBI director when Rosenstein called. Trump, McGahn, and Sessions’s chief of staff, Jody Hunt, who was taking notes, waited while Sessions stepped out to take the call.
He came back in and broke the news.
The president looked stricken. He slumped back in his chair. “Oh my God. This is terrible. This is the end of my presidency. I’m fucked.”
In Trump’s view, this was all Sessions’s fault. “How could you let this happen, Jeff?” he angrily asked. The post of attorney general was his most important appointment, and Sessions had “let him down.” He again compared Sessions unfavorably to Bobby Kennedy and Eric Holder. “You were supposed to protect me.”
Instead, “Everyone tells me if you get one of these independent counsels it ruins your presidency. It takes years and years and I won’t be able to do anything. This is the worst thing that ever happened to me.”
Sessions should resign, Trump said. Sessions said he would, and left, as did Hunt and McGahn.
Hope Hicks, still sitting at her desk outside the office, described Trump as “extremely upset.” She’d seen him in such a state only once before, which was after the Access Hollywood tape was released.
AS HE LEFT the Capitol that evening, McCabe felt a great sense of relief and satisfaction. Now that Rosenstein had appointed a special counsel, he felt he’d fulfilled his most important and urgent mission as acting director. Now that the case was officially open, FBI agents delivered a notice requiring the White House to preserve all documents related to Comey’s dismissal, and McGahn told the staff not to send out any burn bags while he sorted things out.
McCabe went home, opened a can of beer, and drank it standing by the kitchen island, reflecting on the dizzying events of the past week.
Comey had been fired, and McCabe thrust into a leadership role. The FBI had opened a formal investigation of the president, with the knowledge and approval of both the Justice Department and Congress. No one had raised any objections. The Russia investigation was on solid ground. It didn’t matter now if Trump fired him, or Rosenstein or Sessions, for that matter. There was no way Trump could stop the investigation or shut it down without the world knowing.
McCabe felt he’d been sprinting toward some kind of finish line all week. Now it felt as if he’d crossed it. He could stop running.
WITTINGLY OR NOT, Rosenstein could not have found a special counsel more closely aligned with the values espoused by Comey, whom Rosenstein had just helped fire.
Any hopes of Rosenstein that Trump might “welcome” the appointment of a special counsel, especially one of Mueller’s unblemished reputation and stature, were quickly dashed. Early the next morning Trump tweeted, “This is the single greatest witch hunt of a politician in American history!”
And Trump was already suspicious of Mueller, whom he accused of conflicts of interest, especially what he called a “nasty” dispute the two had had over Mueller’s onetime membership in the Trump National Golf Club in Potomac Falls, Virginia.
But Trump’s was a solitary voice among elected officials. Democrats were predictably elated, but even Republican allies of the president praised Rosenstein’s decision to name a special counsel and his choice of Mueller.
Senator Grassley, the head of the Judiciary Committee who’d been so critical of Comey and McCabe, issued a statement saying he had “a great deal of confidence” in Rosenstein “and I respect his decision.” “Mueller has a strong reputation for independence, and comes with the right credentials for this job,” Grassley said.
The Republican Susan Collins of Maine, a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said Mueller “has sterling credentials and is above reproach. He is well respected on both sides of the aisle and will inspire public confidence in the investigation.”
The mainstream media lavished praise on Rosenstein’s decision. “If President Trump thought that by sacking the FBI director, James Comey, he could kill off the investigation into his associates’ ties to the Russian government and its attempt to deliver him the White House, he was wrong,” The New York Times editorialized. “The investigation will go on, now under the leadership of a former FBI director—and this one the president can’t fire on his own.” Rosenstein “has done the nation a service in choosing Mr. Mueller, one of the few people with the experience, stature and reputation to see the job through.”
In a dissenting view, the Wall Street Journal columnist Kimberley Strassel warned that Mueller was “part of the brotherhood of prosecutors” who “see themselves as a legal elite, charged with a noble purpose.” Worse, he was “a longtime colleague of none other than James Comey.” Still, what Strassel saw as defects could as easily be seen as virtues.
None of the praise for Mueller made any impact on Trump, who continued to fume about Mueller’s appointment and Sessions’s treachery. If anything, it only heightened his anger and resentment: the more praise for Mueller, the harder it would be to demonize him.
Later that day, Sessions returned to the White House to submit his resignation, as the president had demanded during his humiliating dressing-down the evening before. He handed it to Trump. “Pursuant to our conversation of yesterday, and at your request, I hereby offer my resignation,” the letter began.
Trump took the letter and put it in his inside jacket pocket. Then he asked Sessions if he wanted to stay on as attorney general. Sessions equivocated. Trump asked him again, and then again, almost as if Trump wanted to see Sessions beg for the job. Finally Sessions said he wanted to stay, but added the decision was up to the president.
With Sessions’s humiliation complete, Trump shook his hand and didn’t accept his resignation. But he kept the letter.
ROBERT MUELLER DIDN’T waste any time. On May 18, the day after he was named special counsel, he and two close associates he’d already named to his team, Aaron Zebley, his former chief of staff at the FBI, and James Quarles, one of his law partners, arrived at FBI headquarters for a briefing on progress in the Russia case. McCabe, Page, Strzok, and Moffa all attended, and Moffa led the briefing. As usual, Page freely offered her observations and opinions.
Afterward, Mueller asked McCabe, “Who was that woman in there? At the end of the table. I want her for my team.”
When McCabe told her the news, Page resisted. She was trying to spend more time with her young children and husband. She knew Mueller’s reputation and that working for him would be a full-time, seven-day-a-week commitment. She didn’t want to abandon McCabe just as he was stepping into his role as acting director.
“You don’t say ‘no’ to Bob Mueller,” McCabe cautioned. “For better or worse, I never said ‘no’ to Bob Mueller.”
Page got the message: If the acting director of the FBI never turned down a request from Mueller, then what right did she have?
The next day, she sat down alone with Mueller. “I’m unbelievably honored and grateful” to be asked, she said, but wanted him to know she had two young children.
“Well, family comes first,” Mueller said, though she doubted he (or any other men of his generation) really knew what that meant. If something blew up at 5:00 p.m. on a Friday, no one was going to leave the office.
But Page agreed to sign on for forty-five days, long enough for his team to get up and running.
Not long after, Mueller asked Strzok to join as well (unaware, of course, of his relationship with Page). “You’d be very good,” Mueller said.
Strzok, too, had doubts, though not because of family commitments. Leaving his job at FBI headquarters for a special counsel investigation, no matter how important or prestigious, was not a standard path for advancement at the FBI. He was in line to be a special agent in charge for a major city, and then a top headquarters job. Going with Mueller might be no more than a path to early retirement.
Page urged Strzok not to take up Mueller on his offer, both for those reasons and because, under the circumstances of their prior affair, she didn’t think the two of them should be working so closely together.
On the other hand, Strzok, too, was reluctant to say no to Mueller. And it was a chance to work on what could be the case of a lifetime.
The two debated the issue that week in an exchange of text messages.
“A case which will be in the history books,” Strzok said. “A million people sit in AD [assistant director] and staff jobs. This is a chance to DO. In maybe the most important case of our lives.”
“No way, dude. I really don’t think you should do it,” Page answered. She also expressed doubts about her own abilities in such a high-powered group, but a friend encouraged her because “I lean in and have a stronger work ethic than anyone she knows.”
Strzok was quick to bolster her confidence: “You have passion and curiosity, which is more than half of the battle anyway.”
As for himself, “I personally have a sense of unfinished business,” and “Now I need to fix it and finish it.”
“You shouldn’t take this on,” Page persisted. “I promise you, I would tell you if you should.” She continued, “We can’t work closely on another case again,” but “I want you to do what is right for you.”
“Sigh. Yeah, I suppose that’s right. But god we’re a good team. Is that playing into your decision/your advice to me?”
“No, not at all,” Page replied. “I just think we’re both ready for a change. Truly.” And Page said they needed to consider the “realistic outcomes” of the investigation, which included a finding that Trump hadn’t colluded with the Russians.
“You and I both know the odds are nothing,” Strzok responded. “If I thought it was likely, I’d be there no question. I hesitate in part because of my gut sense and concern there’s no there there.”*
Given the evidence he’d seen so far, Strzok was dubious that there was some kind of massive conspiracy with Trump at the center in the role of Mafia don. He thought it more likely that “it was a bunch of corrupt incompetents with individual agendas engaged in unethical and illegal activity,” as he put it.
Still, the possibility remained that Trump was working in a clandestine manner with a foreign power to win the presidency of the United States. As Strzok later said, “People were desperate to work on this. It was like parents volunteering their firstborn children for the war, because everyone understood the gravity and how important an endeavor it was.”
In the end, Strzok, too, said yes.
Mueller was able to assemble a highly accomplished and experienced team of prosecutors. Some, like Zebley (whose nickname was the “energizer bunny”), he brought with him from his law firm, WilmerHale. Others filled niches of expertise. Most Mueller had known for years, and they were devoted to him.
Federal law barred Mueller from asking anyone’s political affiliation. (In the heavily Democratic District of Columbia, where the primary usually decides the outcome in local elections, many voters register as Democrats, even if they vote for Republican presidential candidates.) Nonetheless, every applicant’s record was scoured for partisan political activism—conservative or liberal—which was disqualifying.
Within the team the issue of political affiliation never surfaced; no one knew or cared, so long as it had no impact on their work. That didn’t stop the topic from being one of obsessive interest to Trump and his supporters, especially after The Wall Street Journal reported that Andrew Weissmann had attended Hillary Clinton’s election night party in New York. That did prompt some discussion within the Mueller team, but no one thought it disqualified him. Weissmann primarily worked on the Manafort case, not on the Trump case.
Zebley had represented Justin Cooper, the Clinton aide who installed the server at the Clintons’ residence and was a witness in the email case. But that didn’t make him a Clinton partisan or pose a conflict.
And Mueller himself, of course, was a Republican.
Trump had less to fear from any political bias than from the team’s deeply held belief in the rule of law.
THE SATURDAY AFTER Mueller was appointed, May 20, Rosenstein called McCabe to ask him to meet with Mueller that weekend to discuss logistics. They gathered in Rosenstein’s office the next day. Zebley was there from Mueller’s team, along with one of Rosenstein’s staff. McCabe brought Carl Ghattas from the FBI’s national security team.
An entirely different Rosenstein was on display from the previous week: Mueller’s appointment had relieved some of the pressure on him, but gone was any sense of warmth or willingness to confide in McCabe. And instead of logistics, he confronted McCabe with the photo of him in his wife’s campaign T-shirt. “You should think about recusing,” Rosenstein told him.
McCabe was startled and upset. It wasn’t fair. As he’d already told Sessions and McGahn during his job interview, McCabe told Rosenstein that the bureau had already thoroughly examined the issue of his wife’s campaign and McAuliffe’s contributions and concluded there was no conflict. McCabe had done nothing wrong. He offered to produce internal FBI memos that had reached that conclusion.
But Rosenstein persisted. Finally McCabe said, “If anyone should be recusing himself, it’s you.” After all, Rosenstein was a major witness to Comey’s firing. “You’re involved in this.”
The comment infuriated Rosenstein. He told McCabe and Ghattas to leave the room so he could talk to Mueller.
When they returned, Rosenstein looked sullen. “I’m not getting involved in this,” Mueller said. “It’s not in my scope. You guys have to figure this out.”
TRUMP WAS SUPPOSED to name his choice for a new FBI director that week, but didn’t. He wasn’t that happy with any of the candidates he’d met. Trump left the next day for his first foreign visit as president, to Saudi Arabia followed by Israel. Accompanying him on Air Force One was an entourage that included Melania, Jared Kushner and Ivanka, Bannon, and Priebus. That the president was leaving a capital consumed by scandal, intrigue, the firing of the FBI director, and the appointment of a special counsel drew numerous comparisons to Richard Nixon’s trip to Egypt at the height of the Watergate crisis.
During the flight Priebus asked Trump about Sessions’s resignation letter. Both he and Bannon worried Trump might use it as leverage with Sessions, as a kind of “shock collar,” as Priebus put it. As long as Trump had the letter, he had “DOJ by the throat,” Priebus said. He and Bannon had told Sessions they’d get the letter back from the president with a notation that he was not accepting it. But Trump told Priebus on the plane that the letter was back at the White House, somewhere in the residence.
In fact it was in Trump’s pocket. On the flight to Tel Aviv he pulled it out and brandished it before some of his other senior advisers and asked what he should do with it.
Back in Washington, Priebus again asked for Sessions’s letter. Trump “slapped the desk” and said he’d left it at their hotel. But Trump subsequently opened his desk drawer, pulled out the letter, and showed it to the White House staff secretary, Rob Porter.
Back from the trip, Trump kept up a steady drumbeat of criticisms of Mueller and what Trump considered the special counsel’s conflicts. As the president later tweeted, “Is Robert Mueller ever going to release his conflicts of interest with respect to President Trump, including the fact that we had a very nasty & contentious business relationship, I turned him down to head the FBI (one day before appointment as S.C.) & Comey is his close friend.”
He also complained that the law firm where Mueller had been a partner, WilmerHale, had taken on clients who challenged Trump policies, such as his tough stand on immigration. The firm also represented the Trump family members Ivanka and Jared Kushner.
But even his closest advisers had trouble taking any of these complaints seriously. Mueller had resigned from Trump National in 2011 and asked in a letter to the club if a pro rata portion of his initiation fee could be refunded. The club’s controller had replied that he would be placed on a waiting list, which was the club’s usual refund policy. That had been the end of the correspondence. There was nothing “nasty” about it, or even a dispute. Why Trump thought otherwise—or was even aware of such a minor administrative detail—was a mystery.
Trump hadn’t “turned down” Mueller to be FBI director; he’d sought Mueller’s advice, but Mueller neither applied for nor asked for the position.
That a large law firm like WilmerHale had clients opposed to some of Trump’s policies wasn’t a conflict for Mueller. Trump wasn’t hiring WilmerHale to represent him. And Mueller hadn’t had any involvement with Ivanka or Kushner, who were prospective witnesses in the investigation.
Mueller and Comey weren’t even close friends, though the fact that Mueller and Comey seemed cut from the same cloth (as The Wall Street Journal had noted) is probably what most unnerved Trump.
Bannon told Trump that his complaints about Mueller were “ridiculous,” and the issue about the golf club fees was both “ridiculous and petty.”
McGahn, too, told Trump the purported conflicts were “silly.”
Trump ignored them.
Trump took his complaints about Mueller to McGahn and asked him to reach out to Rosenstein. Now that a special counsel was investigating Trump for possible obstruction of justice, McGahn was a key potential witness, which made contacting Rosenstein even more inappropriate. McGahn said he wouldn’t do it and told Trump he should enlist one of his personal lawyers.
Even then, it was a bad idea. It would “look like still trying to meddle in [the] investigation” and “knocking out Mueller” would be “[a]nother fact used to claim obst[ruction] of just[ice],” according to notes of the conversation. The notes also indicate that McGahn warned Trump that his “biggest exposure” was not the act of firing Comey but his “other contacts” and “calls” and his “ask re: Flynn.”
On May 23, the Justice Department said its ethics lawyers had reviewed potential conflicts involving Robert Mueller and “determined that Mr. Mueller’s participation in the matters assigned to him is appropriate.”
A WEEK LATER, Trump finally sent Sessions’s resignation letter back to him, and only then because McGahn and Bannon had kept insisting on it. On it he’d scrawled “not accepted.”
That same day, Trump interviewed yet another candidate to be FBI director: Christopher A. Wray, apparently at the behest of Chris Christie. (Wray had represented Christie in the Bridgegate scandal, and the two had been friends since they worked together as young lawyers in the Justice Department.) But Wray had also worked closely with Comey, as an assistant attorney general when Comey was the deputy, and Mueller, when Mueller was FBI director. The Yale-educated Wray was also cut from the same mold of elite former prosecutors that had troubled the Wall Street Journal editorial writers.
Nonetheless, a week later Trump tweeted the news: “I will be nominating Christopher A. Wray, a man of impeccable credentials, to be the new Director of the FBI. Details to follow.”
ALMOST EXACTLY ONE month after he was fired, Comey appeared on Capitol Hill to testify before the Senate Intelligence Committee investigating Russian influence on the presidential election. In the wake of the explosive reporting on his memos and Trump’s request for loyalty and interference in the Flynn investigation, Comey had maintained his silence. The public’s curiosity had reached fever pitch. For better or worse, Comey was the man of the hour, eclipsing anything he’d experienced before, even at the height of the Ashcroft controversy.
Spectators started lining up at 4:15 a.m. to get one of the coveted seats in the hearing room. All the major television networks aired live coverage, and more than eighteen million viewers initially tuned in, rising to nearly twenty million as Comey’s testimony continued. Millions more watched on live streaming services.
“When I was appointed FBI Director in 2013, I understood that I served at the pleasure of the president,” Comey began. “Even though I was appointed to a 10-year term, which Congress created in order to underscore the importance of the FBI being outside of politics and independent, I understood that I could be fired by a president for any reason or for no reason at all. And on May the ninth, when I learned that I had been fired, for that reason I immediately came home as a private citizen. But then the explanations, the shifting explanations, confused me and increasingly concerned me. They confused me because the president and I had had multiple conversations about my job, both before and after he took office, and he had repeatedly told me I was doing a great job, and he hoped I would stay. And I had repeatedly assured him that I did intend to stay and serve out the years of my term. He told me repeatedly that he had talked to lots of people about me, including our current Attorney General, and had learned that I was doing a great job, and that I was extremely well-liked by the FBI workforce.
“So it confused me when I saw on television the president saying that he actually fired me because of the Russia investigation, and learned again from the media that he was telling privately other parties that my firing had relieved great pressure on the Russian investigation. I was also confused by the initial explanation that was offered publicly that I was fired because of the decisions I had made during the election year. That didn’t make sense to me for a whole bunch of reasons, including the time and all the water that had gone under the bridge since those hard decisions that had to be made. That didn’t make any sense to me. And although the law required no reason at all to fire an FBI director, the administration then chose to defame me and more importantly the FBI by saying that the organization was in disarray, that it was poorly led, that the workforce had lost confidence in its leader. Those were lies, plain and simple. And I am so sorry that the FBI workforce had to hear them, and I’m so sorry that the American people were told them.”
Comey also saw his opening statement as a way to make the farewell speech he hadn’t been able to deliver:
I worked every day at the FBI to help make that great organization better, and I say help, because I did nothing alone at the FBI. There are no indispensable people at the FBI. The organization’s great strength is that its values and abilities run deep and wide. The FBI will be fine without me. The FBI’s mission will be relentlessly pursued by its people, and that mission is to protect the American people and uphold the constitution of the United States. I will deeply miss being part of that mission, but this organization and its mission will go on long beyond me and long beyond any particular administration.
I have a message before I close for my former colleagues of the FBI but first I want the American people to know this truth: The FBI is honest. The FBI is strong. And the FBI is and always will be independent. And now to my former colleagues, if I may.
At this point Comey struggled to hold back tears: “I am so sorry that I didn’t get the chance to say goodbye to you properly. It was the honor of my life to serve beside you, to be part of the FBI family, and I will miss it for the rest of my life. Thank you for standing watch. Thank you for doing so much good for this country. Do that good as long as ever you can.”
In written comments distributed to the committee, Comey gave a detailed account of his interactions with the president: the January 6 briefing at Trump Tower; the January 27 dinner; the February 14 meeting in the Oval Office; the March 30 and April 11 phone calls.
As senators began their questioning, he elaborated on why he wrote the memos. “I was honestly concerned he might lie about the nature of our meeting so I thought it important to document,” he said, the “he” being Trump. “I knew there might come a day when I would need a record of what had happened, not just to defend myself, but to defend the FBI and our integrity as an institution and the independence of our investigative function.”
Comey confirmed that one of his top advisers (whom he didn’t name, but was Jim Baker) had warned him not to tell Trump he wasn’t being investigated because “inevitably his behavior, his conduct will fall within the scope of that work.” But Comey had disagreed. “I thought it was fair to say what was literally true. There was not a counterintelligence investigation of Mr. Trump, and I decided in the moment to say it, given the nature of our conversation.”
And the reason he felt so uncomfortable about the president’s request for loyalty was “the reason that Congress created a 10-year term is so that the director is not feeling as if they’re serving at, with political loyalty owed to any particular person. The statue of justice has a blindfolds on. You’re not supposed to peek out to see whether your patron was pleased with what you’re doing.”
Senator Dianne Feinstein asked why Comey hadn’t been firmer with Trump when he brought up the subject of Flynn.
“Maybe if I were stronger, I would have,” Comey answered. “I was so stunned by the conversation that I just took in. The only thing I could think to say, because I was playing in my mind—because I could remember every word he said—I was playing in my mind, what should my response be? That’s why I carefully chose the words.”
He mentioned the tapes: “Look, I’ve seen the tweet about tapes. Lordy, I hope there are tapes. I remember saying, ‘I agree he is a good guy,’ as a way of saying, I’m not agreeing with what you asked me to do. Again, maybe other people would be stronger in that circumstance.”
Senator Jack Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat, asked why Comey thought he’d been fired.
“It’s my judgment I was fired because of the Russia investigation,” Comey said. “I was fired in some way to change the way the Russia investigation is being conducted. That is a very big deal. And not just because it involves me. The nature of the FBI and the nature of its work requires that it not be the subject of political consideration. And on top of that, you have the Russia investigation itself is vital, because of the threat. And I know I should have said this earlier, but it’s obvious: if any Americans were part of helping the Russians do that to us, that is a very big deal. And I’m confident if that is the case, Director Mueller will find that evidence.”
Angus King, the Maine independent, asked Comey what he thought Trump meant when he said “something like, I hope or I suggest or would you, do you take that as a directive?”
“Yes,” Comey said. “It rings in my ear as: Will no one rid me of this meddlesome priest?”
“I was just going to quote that,” King said. “In 1170, December 29, Henry II said, who will rid me of this meddlesome priest, and the next day, he was killed.”*
COMEY CAME ACROSS as both humble and credible. Trump was furious over Comey’s testimony and the massive media attention it generated, especially Comey’s admission that he’d “leaked” memos detailing what were supposed to be private conversations with Trump. Minutes after Comey finished testifying, Trump dispatched his personal lawyer, Marc Kasowitz, to put a positive spin on Comey’s testimony and brand Comey a liar and a leaker. “The President also never told Mr. Comey, ‘I need loyalty, I expect loyalty’ in form or substance,” Kasowitz said at a press conference. “Of course, the Office of the President is entitled to expect loyalty from those who are serving in an administration, and, from before this President took office to this day, it is overwhelmingly clear that there have been and continue to be those in government who are actively attempting to undermine this administration with selective and illegal leaks of classified information and privileged communications. Mr. Comey has now admitted that he is one of these leakers.
“In sum, it is now established that the President was not being investigated for colluding with the Russians or attempting to obstruct that investigation,” Kasowitz concluded. “As the Committee pointed out today, these important facts for the country to know are virtually the only facts that have not leaked during the long course of these events.”
The next day, at a press conference with the president of Romania, ABC News chief White House correspondent Jonathan Karl said Comey “did say, under oath, that you told him to let the Flynn—you said you hoped the Flynn investigation he could let—”
“I didn’t say that,” Trump interrupted.
“So he lied about that?”
“Well, I didn’t say that,” Trump repeated. “I mean, I will tell you I didn’t say that.”
“And did he ask you to pledge . . .”
“And there would be nothing wrong if I did say it, according to everybody that I’ve read today,” Trump went on. “But I did not say that.”
“And did he ask for a pledge of loyalty from you?* That’s another thing he said.”
“No, he did not.”
“So he said those things under oath. Would you be willing to speak under oath to give your version of those events?” Karl asked.
“One hundred percent,” Trump said. As for Comey, “I hardly know the man. I’m not going to say, I want you to pledge allegiance. Who would do that? Who would ask a man to pledge allegiance under oath? I mean, think of it. I hardly know the man. It doesn’t make sense. No, I didn’t say that, and I didn’t say the other.”
“So if Robert Mueller wanted to speak with you about that you would be willing to talk to him?”
“I would be glad to tell him exactly what I just told you, Jon,” Trump replied.
TRUMP SPENT THE weekend fuming over the press coverage and venting about Mueller’s conflicts. Priebus and Bannon were so worried that Trump might precipitously order Rosenstein to fire Mueller that they summoned Christopher Ruddy to the White House. Ruddy, the chief executive of the conservative Newsmax Media, a longtime conspiracy theorist, and a Trump confidant dubbed the “Trump whisperer” by The Washington Post, was a reliable media conduit. Priebus told Ruddy he hoped they wouldn’t have another blowup like the one that followed Comey’s firing. So Ruddy agreed to send up a trial balloon.
Ruddy appeared that evening on PBS’s NewsHour with Judy Woodruff. “Is President Trump prepared to let the special counsel pursue his investigation?” Woodruff asked.
“Well, I think he’s considering perhaps terminating the special counsel. I think he’s weighing that option.” Ruddy went on, “I mean, Robert Mueller, there are some real conflicts. He comes from a law firm that represents members of the Trump family. He interviewed the day before, a few days before he was appointed special counsel with the president, who was looking at him potentially to become the next FBI director.”
Afterward, Sean Spicer issued a statement that “Mr. Ruddy never spoke to the president regarding this issue,” which prompted Ruddy to send a text message to ABC News: “Spicer issued a bizarre late night press release that a) doesn’t deny my claim the president is considering firing Mueller and b) says I didn’t speak to the president about the matter—when I never claimed to have done so.” He reiterated that “Trump is definitely considering it . . . it’s not something that’s being dismissed.”
Ruddy might not have spoken to Trump directly, but his comments hadn’t come out of thin air. In that sense, the gambit worked: there was an immediate media outcry, and Sanders had to deny that the president intended to fire Mueller. “While the president has the right to, he has no intention to do so,” she told reporters on Air Force One the next day, adding that that’s what the president told her to say.
And Ruddy’s comments prompted Senator Susan Collins to ask Rosenstein, when he testified before the Senate Appropriations Committee, what would happen if Trump ordered him to fire Mueller.
“Senator, I’m not going to follow any order unless I believe those are lawful and appropriate orders,” Rosenstein replied. “Special counsel Mueller may be fired only for good cause, and I am required to put that cause in writing. That’s what I would do. If there were good cause, I would consider it. If there were not good cause, it wouldn’t matter to me what anybody says.”
The Republican Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, warned Trump not to fire Mueller. “The best thing to do is to let Robert Mueller do his job,” Ryan said. “I think the best case for the president is to be vindicated by allowing this investigation to go on thoroughly and independently.”
But Trump again ignored the advice. The president called Sessions at home and asked if he’d “unrecuse” himself and referred to “all of it,” which Sessions took to mean the Russia investigation and oversight of Mueller. Trump’s magnanimity toward Hillary Clinton having apparently run its course, he asked Sessions to direct the Department of Justice to investigate and prosecute Hillary Clinton. Sessions did neither.
On June 14, The Washington Post disclosed that Trump’s most cherished concession from Comey—that Trump himself was not under investigation—was no longer true. “Special Counsel Is Investigating Trump for Possible Obstruction of Justice, Officials Say,” the headline read, which was quickly trumpeted by cable networks. “Trump had received private assurances from then–FBI Director James B. Comey starting in January that he was not personally under investigation,” the story reported. “Officials say that changed shortly after Comey’s firing.”
The revelation set off a rapid-fire series of tweets by Trump that were angry and frustrated even by Trump standards:
“They made up a phony collusion with the Russians story, found zero proof, so now they go for obstruction of justice on the phony story. Nice.”
“You are witnessing the single greatest WITCH HUNT in American political history-led by some very bad and conflicted people!”
“Crooked H destroyed phones w/ hammer, ‘bleached’ emails, & had husband meet w/AG days before she was cleared- & they talk about obstruction?”
“After 7 months of investigations & committee hearings about my ‘collusion with the Russians,’ nobody has been able to show any proof. Sad!”
And, in a pointed criticism of Rosenstein:
“I am being investigated for firing the FBI Director by the man who told me to fire the FBI Director! Witch Hunt.”
Wittingly or not, the tweets confirmed that the president was, indeed, under investigation.
Trump also called Chris Christie to ask what he thought about getting rid of Mueller. Like just about everyone else outside the right-wing fringe, Christie was against it. He said there weren’t any legitimate grounds for removing him and Trump would lose even Republican support in Congress if he did.
Despite the overwhelming advice not to do it, Trump set out to get rid of Mueller.
TRUMP CALLED MCGAHN at 10:31 on the night of the Post story and told him he wanted Mueller removed. He told McGahn to call Rosenstein and tell him to fire Mueller because of the special counsel’s multiple conflicts.
“You gotta do this. You gotta call Rod,” Trump said.
McGahn had no intention of doing so, but all he said was that he’d see what he could do. If he did nothing, maybe Trump would forget, or think better of it.
McGahn was at home on Saturday, June 17, when the president called him from Camp David just before 2:30 p.m. This time Trump was more insistent: “Call Rod. Tell Rod that Mueller has conflicts and can’t be the Special Counsel.” Trump added that “Mueller has to go” and “Call me back when you do it.”*
Worn down by the president’s demands and eager to get him off the phone, McGahn agreed, even though he wasn’t going to do it.
McGahn felt trapped. He thought of Robert Bork, who fired the Watergate special prosecutor, Archibald Cox, in what became known as the Saturday Night Massacre. The resulting public outcry had helped doom Bork’s nomination to the Supreme Court, and Bork complained he was “tired of it being portrayed as the only thing I ever did.”
McGahn had no intention of becoming another Bork. But what would he say the next time the president called? McGahn saw only one way out, which was to resign.