Two days. That's how long it took for President Donald Trump to upend his own administration's rationale behind the firing of FBI Director James Comey, the fallout from which continued to engulf Washington on Thursday.
>In a letter Trump sent to Comey on Tuesday, the president wrote that he fired the director based on the recommendations of Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. But in an interview Thursday with NBC's Lester Holt, Trump claimed that Sessions and Rosenstein didn't influence his decision at all. Trump had already made up his mind.
>"I was going to fire regardless of (their) recommendation," said Trump, calling Comey a "showboat" and "grandstander."
>You know that, I know that. Everybody knows that," Trump said. "You take a look at the FBI a year ago, it was in virtual turmoil, less than a year ago, it hasn't recovered from that."
>Except everyone does not know that, including Andrew McCabe, the FBI's new acting director. The White House said this week that Comey had lost the confidence of the bureau, a claim McCabe contradicted on Thursday when speaking to a Senate committee. “The vast majority of FBI employees enjoyed a deep and positive connection to Director Comey,” McCabe said, which continues "to this day."
>The firing of Comey, McCabe said, would not deter the FBI's investigation into Trump's campaign and Russia: "Simply put, you cannot stop the men and women of the FBI from doing the right thing."
>Republican Richard Burr, the North Carolina senator chairing the Senate Intelligence Committee, called Comey " the most ethical, upstanding individual I’ve had the pleasure to work with."
>And, for what it's worth, a new online poll from NBC News found that a slight majority of Americans — 54% — don't think Comey's sudden firing was appropriate.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/onpolitics/2017/05/11/onpolitics-today-trump-contradicted-himself-comey-firing/101573856/
So about Rod Rosenstein
>The deputy attorney general is getting an invite from senators to brief them about his role in Comey's firing. According to Politico, Rosenstein reached out to Senate Intelligence Committee leaders about meeting amid reports that he was "furious" about the White House's characterization of his recommendation that allegedly caused Comey's firing.
>Democrat and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer asked Rosenstein more than two dozen questions in a letter on Thursday, including whether Comeys' firing came days after he asked for more resources for the FBI's Russia inquiry, as has been widely reported.
>The all-senators briefing with Rosentein is slated for next week, according to a spokesman Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
Russia reportedly tricked Trump's White House
>Optics be damned, Trump met with top Russian diplomats on Wednesday, the day after firing the man overseeing the FBI's investigation into his own campaign and Russia. In a move both surprising and not, all media was barred from the meeting except one Russia-owned news agency. Photos soon surfaced of a beaming Donald Trump with Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, the man who's caused much of Trump's Russia-related headaches through his communications with Trump associates, including now-fired adviser Michael Flynn.
>CNN reported Thursday that the White House is furious over release of the photos, claiming the Russians "tricked us."
>>138969
>Actually admitting the Russians tricked you
>During an investigation about whether the Russians compromised your staff
I hope this quote has a name attached, because this shit is rich.
>>138988
Actually it fits into the 'fake news' narrative nicely. There isn't any irony to the 'tricked us with the photo' story if you are denying that the Russian meddling in the election was ever real to start with. Whatever you think of the effectiveness of their goal post moving, nobody can say they aren't consistent. That's the same kind of "stick-to-it-ness" that the GOP clamored over in the Bush era.
The fucking russians are getting exactly what they want. How is Trump's cabinet not advising him about this stupid shit?
So wait, they let Sergey Kislyak, the possible spy who's tied up in the Sessions and Flynn investigation, into the oval office... why is Trump trying to sabotage himself? I mean it's the Russians, even ignoring whatever cultural biases you want to put on them, they're infamous for spying on the US, and trying to undermine western democracy, the fact that the President felt he could trust them over his own countrymen is a disaster. And that he would choose to let this happen RIGHT AFTER he fired the guy who's supposedly investigating him and his group for treason, is he blind? Does he have zero sense of strategy? It's like he's trying to see just how much abuse his base can take at this point.
>>138968
>Trump contradicts himself
HOLY FUCK HOW CAN THIS BE REAL LIFE
>>138968
>Trump contradicts himself on the Comey firing
And every Democrat who was raging at Comey about the Clinton investigation is contradicting themselves now, what of it?
The guy was garbage either way.
>>139051
Except very few Democrats were ever talking about firing Comey, only Trump and co.
>>139051
Man, two months is enough time for the situation to change. That's like saying everyone who was in favor of the Iraq war contradicted themselves when they decided to be against it. And saying "What about the Democrats" doesn't change a thing about Trump. Trump is still going on contradicting himself constantly like someone in the early stages of dementia could be expected to.
>>138968
He's just using confusion-fu to distract and confound the liberals.
>>139303
Because there were few of them, they didn't contradict themselves.