I never asked Comey to stop investigating Flynn. Just more Fake News covering another Comey lie!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 3, 2017
There was an 18-day gap between the heads up from former Acting Attorney General Sally Yates regarding Flynn's activities with the Russians and his removal by the White House.
"(White House counsel Don) McGahn came back to me and did not sound like an emergency," Trump said of Yates' information about Flynn.
"This man (Flynn) has served for many years, he's a general, he's a — in my opinion — a very good person. I believe that it would be very unfair to hear from somebody who we don't even know and immediately run out and fire a general."
White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer has previously expressed skepticism about Yates' motives in giving her initial heads up about Flynn to the White House. On Tuesday, Spicer praised the "due process" of the White House in the lead up to Flynn's dismissal and dismissed Yates as "someone who is not exactly a supporter of the president's agenda."
"You have someone who you have to wonder whether — why they are telling you something," Spicer added.
Yates testified Monday to the Senate Judiciary subcommittee that she told the White House that Flynn could be "blackmailed by the Russians" because he had misled Vice President Mike Pence about his conversations with Kremlin diplomats.
"We were concerned that the American people had been misled about the underlying conduct and what General Flynn had done," she said.
Trump also told Holt that he was not aware of Flynn's payments from the Russian and Turkish governments, but wondered if maybe former President Barack Obama did.
"Obama perhaps knew because [Flynn] had clearance from the Obama administration," Trump told NBC News. "And his clear — and this is something they never want to report — he had clearance from the Obama administration. The highest clearance you can have."
While Flynn's clearance was continued by the Obama administration, he was also fired by the prior administration from his post as head of the Defense Intelligence Agency in 2014.Obama also warned Trump against hiring Flynn less than 48 hours after the November election, three former Obama administration officials have told NBC News.
On Wednesday, the Senate Intelligence Committee subpoenaed Flynn — the first time they've used that subpoena power since the joint inquiry into the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, according to a Senate historian. The Senate Intelligence Committee also subpoenaed documents from Flynn after he declined to provide them if he wasn't offered immunity.
NTodd reminded me of this. By the way, the full interview transcript, if you can follow it, is here. It includes gems like this brave attempt to square a circle:
HOLT: But when you put out tweets it's a total hoax. It's a taxpayer charade. And you're looking for a new FBI director, are you not sending that person a message to lay off?
TRUMP: No, I'm not doing that. I think that we have to get back to work. But I want to find out -- I want to get to the bottom.
If Russia hacked -- if Russia did anything having to do with our election, I want to know about it.
HOLT: Well, there's already -- there's already intelligence from virtually every intelligence agency that yes, that happened (ph).
TRUMP: I'll tell you this. If Russia or anybody else is trying to interfere with our elections, I think it's a horrible thing and I want to get to the bottom of it. And I want to make sure it will never, ever happen.
But he fired Comey because the Russia interference story is fake:
TRUMP: They -- he made a recommendation. He's highly respected. Very good guy, very smart guy.
And the Democrats like him. The Republicans like him.
He had made a recommendation. But regardless of recommendation, I was going to fire Comey knowing there was no good time to do it
And in fact, when I decided to just do it, I said to myself -- I said, you know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story. It's an excuse by the Democrats for having lost an election that they should've won.
And the reason they should've won it is the electoral college is almost impossible for a Republican to win. It's very hard because you start off at such a disadvantage. So, everybody was thinking they should've won the election. This was an excuse for having lost an election.
So you see, he fired Comey because he won the election; and the story of Russia's involvement is fake, but he wants to get to the bottom of it, although there isn't one, because it's fake, and he fired Comey because it was fake, and he wants to make sure it will never happen again if it did, which it didn't; because the whole story is fake.
And he didn't fire Flynn because Sally Yates said he should, because that didn't sound like an emergency. He fired Flynn because Flynn lied to the FBI, which nobody else knew about until the plea deal was announced last week.
See?
No comments:
Post a Comment