Last Updated May 4, 2018 8:56 AM EDT
It’s been nearly one year exactly since former FBI Director James Comey discovered he was fired, by television, on May 9, 2017. On Friday, Comey told “CBS This Morning” he’s proud of the work the FBI has done since, and hopes people will “speak out” when the nation’s institutions are attacked.
“Whatever our vigorous policy disagreements, our values are all we have and if our leaders and the people they lead don’t recognize that and stand up for those values, who are we as a country?” Comey said, in what is his final TV appearance to complete his tour for his new book, “A Higher Loyalty.”
Comey’s appearance came shortly after President Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani claimed on Fox News Wednesday night that Mr. Trump fired Comey “because Comey would not, among other things, say that he wasn’t a target” in the FBI’s Russia investigation. Giuliani compared FBI investigators who raided the home and office of Trump attorney Michael Cohen to Nazi storm troopers. Comey addressed that claim Friday morning.
“The notion that the FBI is made up of Nazi storm troopers is just wrong and dangerous,” Comey said.
Giuliani also called for Comey to be prosecuted — as has Mr. Trump — for divulging memos he wrote last year about interactions with the president. Mr. Trump has slammed Comey as an “untruthful slime ball,” calling Comey a “LEAKER & LIAR.”
“We’re lucky to live in a country where facts matter and that people aren’t prosecuted by people tweeting about them,” Comey said Friday.
Comey said that, if he happened to be special counsel Robert Mueller, he would have a number of questions for Mr. Trump — specifically, related to discovering whether there was any obstruction of justice. Comey said it would be important to “understand what his state of mind was,” referring to Mr. Trump. It remains unclear if or when Mr. Trump would be interviewed by Mueller.
Comey, in his book, calls Mr. Trump “untethered to truth.” On CBS’ The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, Comey joked he is like the breakup Mr. Trump can’t get past.
“He’s tweeted at me probably 50 times,” Comey said of Mr. Trump to Colbert. “I’ve been gone for a year, I’m like the breakup he can’t get over. He wakes up in the morning … I’m out there living my best life, he wakes up in the morning and tweets at me.”
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