President Trump urged James Comey to make a pledge of personal loyalty to him and asked the former FBI director to “lift the cloud” of an investigation into whether his campaign colluded with Russia, it was claimed last night.
In seven pages of extraordinary written testimony to Congress, Mr Comey detailed the interactions he had with Mr Trump before he was abruptly fired last month.
Mr Comey, who will appear before the Senate intelligence committee in person today, described a president who demanded personal fealty, and who asked the FBI chief to drop an investigation into Mike Flynn, the former national security adviser.
In January, a week after Mr Trump took office, Mr Comey reached the conclusion that the president was hoping to “create some sort of patronage relationship” with his FBI chief.
At a private dinner in the White House Mr Trump allegedly told Mr Comey: “I need loyalty, I expect loyalty.” Mr Comey described the tense moments that followed: “I didn’t move, speak, or change my facial expression in any way during the awkward silence that followed. We simply looked at each other in silence.
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“He then said, ‘I need loyalty.’ I replied, ‘You will always get honesty from me.’ He paused and then said, ‘That’s what I want, honest loyalty.’”
Mr Comey based his account on contemporaneous notes that he took. He claims that during a phone call on March 30 Mr Trump “described the Russia investigation as ‘a cloud’ that was impairing his ability to act on behalf of the country”.
Mr Comey added: “He said he had nothing to do with Russia, had not been involved with hookers in Russia, and had always assumed he was being recorded when in Russia. He asked what we could do to ‘lift the cloud.’”
The mention of prostitutes was apparently a reference to a “salacious and unverified” dossier on Mr Trump compiled by a former MI6 spy. Mr Comey describes how he briefed the president on it alone to minimise embarrassment.
During a third conversation, in the Oval Office, Mr Trump asked Mr Comey to drop an investigation into Mr Flynn, who was sacked as national security adviser in February after he misled the vice president about his conversations with a Russian ambassador.
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According to Mr Comey, Mr Trump said: “I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go.”
Mr Comey said he told colleagues at the FBI about this conversation but did not alert the Justice Department because he did not want to taint the FBI investigation into alleged Russian interference in the US election — and because there was “nothing available to corroborate my account”.
Mr Trump also allegedly repeatedly asked Mr Comey to “get out” to the public the message that the president was not under investigation. Mr Comey did tell Mr Trump that he was not personally under investigation, but did not want to make that public, in part because he would need to issue an update if the situation changed.
Mr Comey says he spoke alone with Barack Obama, when he was president, only twice. He adds: “I can recall nine one-on-one conversations with President Trump in four months – three in person and six on the phone.”
Mr Trump responded to the former FBI chief’s claims through a lawyer, saying: “The president feels totally and completely vindicated.”
