President Donald Trump called James Comey a “liar” in a tweet on Wednesday after the former FBI director said he was unaware at the time of problems with the opposition search dossier on Trump during the 2016 election campaign that was used in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act warrants the FBI obtained for the Russia probe.
Trump was specifically responding to a tweet from conservative political commentator Paul Sperry, who wrote that “Comey swears he doesn't remember hearing anything about Steele's primary subsource, Igor Danchenko, being the subject of an FBI C.I. investigation, as a suspected Russian agent, and doesn't recall his own CrossFire Hurricane team interviewing Danchenko in Jan 2017.”
Comey admitted to the Senate Judiciary Committee that if he knew today what he did during the Russia probe, he would have taken a more skeptical view about the key surveillance request and would likely have given him pause in pursuing it, NPR reported.
However, Comey continued to defend the main part of the work done by the FBI in the probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election; he insisted it had been properly justified and professionally conducted.
Trump wrote in another tweet that Comey “should be arrested on the spot” for his insistence that the investigation was done by the book.
The president also retweeted several other comments by Sperry pointing out what he felt was falsehoods stated by Comey and other officials at the FBI, CIA and Department of Justice at the time.