An important quote from former FBI director James Comey shows who he is.
Former FBI Director James Comey responds to his indictment
Former FBI director James Comey responded to indictments from the Trump administration via Instagram and called on voters to continue their engagement.
Washington – James Comey is hard to miss.
The 6-8 inch former FBI director stands out in the room and in history.
From the 9/11 terrorist attacks to the 2016 election and the fierce Trump administration, Comey was at the heart of some of Washington’s biggest drama.
Throughout his long career, he has gained many detractors, both among Democrats and Republicans.
But he is also praised for his sincerity.
Comey returned to the spotlight after being charged with lying to Congress and obstructing him. The allegations were levelled after years of turbulent relationship with President Donald Trump, who fired Comey for investigating contacts between the 2016 campaign and Russia.
Here is an important quote from Comey showing who he is.
“Make something good from evil”
When I spoke with USA Today in 2018 about the loss of my young son over 20 years ago, Comey shed tears.
He was the first to share that personal story in his book. “Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership.”
Comey said he did so after his son died from a treatable infection that doctors and hospitals failed to diagnose.
“I found it devastating,” he said of the loss. “My wife found something devastating, and I saw her trying to lead it to something good, and I learned from looking at her.
Patrice Comey has launched a campaign to require doctors and hospitals to test for Group B Streptococcus, a bacterial infection that can be treated with penicillin during labor if detected towards the end of pregnancy.
James Comey said the lesson was “making something good from evil, from pain, from loss.”
“Unusual in Washington.”
When President Barack Obama chose Comey to lead the FBI in 2013, he called people who don’t care about politics but focus on getting the job done “unusual in Washington.”
Obama hinted at the actions of the former Deputy Attorney General in one of the George W. Bush administration’s most dramatic moments.
In 2004, White House lawyer Alberto Gonzalez and White House Chief of Staff Andy Carde tried to persuade Attorney General John Ashcroft, a disease of acute pancreatitis, while in hospital bed. Comey, the top deputy attorney general of Ashcroft at the time, learned of Gonzalez and Card’s plans, and hurried along with Mueller to Ashcroft’s hospital room.
Both threatened to step down if the White House renewed the program. As a result, it was not reapproved.
“He was ready to give up the job he loved, but that was part of something that he felt fundamentally wrong,” Obama said.
“This is torture.”
At a 2013 confirmation hearing, Comey officially approved waterboarding while serving as deputy attorney general, but testified that she has long believed that the practice is torture and illegal.
“When I first learned about waterboarding… my reaction was torture. That’s still what I think,” he said. “If I were the FBI Director, it has nothing to do with that.”
A coalition of groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights Watch, raised concerns about two 2004 Department of Justice memos that approved the use of waterboarding.
Comey testified to Attorney General Ashcroft that he told Attorney General Ashcroft that the practice was wrong, but added that the law on the issue is “very vague.”
“He made my argument completely and said the principal was fully equipped in the policy, so my proposal was rejected,” Comey said.
“It makes me a little nauseous.”
Comey stubbornly defended her 2016 decision to publicly announce the reopening of investigations into Hillary Clinton’s private mail servers 11 days before the November election, telling a Senate panel that it was “the FBI’s death as an American agency.”
Still, Comey acknowledged the possible effects of such a move. “It makes me feel a bit nauseous that we were affecting the election,” Comey told the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2017.
Comey said he had no choice but to inform lawmakers about the development of the investigation in late October. He comes after learning that thousands of Clinton emails have been retrieved from a laptop used by former New York lawmaker Anthony Weiner, husband of Clinton’s top aide Hama Abedin. He recalled the decision as a personal struggle to “hide or talk” about the rapidly unfolding developments that are close to elections.
“We had to step into a world of really bad things,” Comey said.
Trump’s “Silent Circle of Consent”
Comey knows the mob. As a prosecutor, he helped dismantle Gambino crime families.
And when he briefed the presidential election in early 2017, at his first meeting with Trump – Comey was getting a flashback.
“I was sitting there thinking of holy crap. They were trying to make each of us ‘Amica Nostra’. “As crazy, mad, I suddenly felt, in the blink of an eye, that the presidential election was trying to make us all part of the same family and that the team was trying to make it “our.” ”
Comey told USA Today in 2018 that Trump “is not because he’s breaking his legs or shaking the store owner, but a mafia comparison hit him.
But he said that the culture of leadership is similar: “You will be judged by your boss by your loyalty, your loyalty.”
Trump, Comey wrote in his book, “pulls all those who exist in a silent circle.”
“You can’t lead the station effectively.”
Trump surprised the political world by firing Comey in 2017, saying that he “didn’t effectively lead the bureau.”
The president said he was following the recommendations of Justice Department leaders who expedited Comey in her time as Secretary of State for the handling of investigations into Clinton’s use of private mail servers.
However, critics viewed the move as a blatant attempt to short-circumvent the investigation into Russian hacking in the 2016 presidential election.
The fire has broadened the Justice Department’s investigation into the appointment of special advisor to Robert Mueller and the contacts of the Republican campaign with Russia and Moscow intervention in the 2016 presidential election.
“Lord, I hope there’s a tape.”
In his first public comment after being fired by Trump in 2017, Comey portrayed the embarrassment of the president while testifying before the Senate Intelligence Committee.
Among the most spectacular and consistent themes carried out through more than two hours of testimony was that Comey believed the president could not be trusted.
“Lord, I hope there’s a tape,” Comey said of his personal meeting with Trump. He testified that the president urged former national security advisor Michael Flynn to stop the investigation.
After Trump suggested in a social media post that there might be a “tape” of his conversation with Comey, the former FBI director said he moved to publish aspects of his notes by recruiting friends to share the content of his notes with reporters.
Comey said he hopes news reports will encourage the appointment of special advisors. In fact, the Ministry of Justice appointed Mueller as a special advisor to oversee the investigation in Russia one day after the memo’s existence was revealed.
“Cool Shell Formation”
The FBI asked the former head of this agency after his Instagram post about the collection of shells that Instagram formed “8647.”
“Cool shell formations on my beach walk,” Comey said of the photos.
Comey’s post was interpreted as someone who said “86.” Or remove – number 47. Trump is the 47th president.
Comey defeated the photo and said in a subsequent Instagram post he didn’t realize the message could be related to violence.
“I didn’t realize I was linking those numbers to violence,” Comey posted on May 15th.
“We don’t live on our laps.”
After being charged on September 25th, Comey said his heart was “broken” for the Justice Department.
“My family and I have known for many years that there is a cost to stand up to Donald Trump, but we couldn’t imagine ourselves living the other way,” Comey said in a video clip she shares on Instagram. “We don’t live on our laps. We shouldn’t do either.”
Comey mentioned her daughter Mohren, who was fired by President Donald Trump from the Manhattan U.S. Attorney’s Office in July and later sued the Trump administration.
“The person I’ve loved recently said, ‘Fear is the tool of a tyrant’, and she’s right, but I’m not afraid. “Instead, you’re engaged and you hope you’re paying attention, and you’ll vote so that your beloved country depends on it.”
Contributors: Josh Meyer, Aisha Baguch, Susan Page, Bert Jansen.