It’s interesting that Donald Trump, in his letter terminating FBI Director James Comey, noted that Mr. Comey had allegedly told the President* on three separate occasions that he is not being investigated for two reasons: the FBI admitted in a legal filing recently that they are, indeed, directly investigating Donald Trump’s public plea for Russia to hack his opponents, and another little tidbit of information that surfaced in a Wall Street Journal report — Comey did indeed suspect collusion. In fact, there is evidence.
While Trump, who has said that Comey did Hillary Clinton a huge favor in not charging her for crimes she did not commit, claims that the firing was because of how oh-so-terribly unfair the former Director was to his former opponent (the same one he asked Russia to hack), CNN reports that the firing was because Comey refused to provide Trump with an assurance of personal loyalty and because the investigation was “accelerating” (Comey had requested additional funds for the investigation just before he was terminated).
The WSJ reports that at the time of his firing, contrary to Trump’s assertion, Comey had become increasingly concerned to the point of requesting daily instead of weekly updates on the investigation:
Mr. Comey started receiving daily instead of weekly updates on the investigation, beginning at least three weeks ago, according to people with knowledge of the matter and the progress of the Federal Bureau of Investigation probe. Mr. Comey was concerned by information showing possible evidence of collusion, according to these people.
White House officials said Wednesday that Mr. Trump had for months been contemplating the possibility of removing Mr. Comey, and that the dismissal this week wasn’t connected to the Russian probe.
Comey had been asked by lawmakers to “accelerate” the investigation, according to the WSJ, and had briefed them on Monday on his plan to do so — yes, right before he was fired.
Donald Trump is getting worried. Recently, he changed his Twitter header to a quote of one of his own tweets. That tweet was a lie claiming that James Clapper had confirmed that there was “no evidence” to support claims of collusion.
The investigation is heating up. Subpoenas have been issued, and every animal — even especially stupid, especially orange ones — can sense its end.
Featured image via Getty Images (Pool)