Fired FBI director Jim Comey stunned yesterday when he declined an invitation to appear before the Senate Intelligence Committee next week in a closed session. Now a "close associate" of his told the NYTimes that he's more than willing to testify, but not behind closed doors.
Why it matters: Those closed sessions routinely leak to the press, but if Comey has something to say, a public hearing will be harder for Trump to avoid or describe as "fake news."
President Trump may wind up paying a huge price for the Comey debacle. But so far, it's playing out a bit like the Access Hollywood tapes where Trump boasted to Billy Bush about groping women: Washington freaks and Trump Country yawns.
Instead of getting caught boasting of groping a woman's genitals, Trump kneecapped the FBI's top man. This time, the stakes are even higher: Trump has raised the possibility of secret taping in the People's House. And by his own account, he crossed traditional lines of independence between the White House and the FBI.
Health care in immigrant prisons leads to suffering and death, according to a new Human Rights Watch report that includes analysis from independent medical experts. The report highlights several medical cases that have been mishandled in the immigrant jail system.
The findings: Dangerous patterns of over-reliance on unqualified medical staff, unreasonable delays or denials of care, subpar mental health care, and bad record-keeping, in public and private prisons both. This all contributed to seven deaths in detention out of a total of 18 in-custody deaths.
The list: "acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), former Justice Department Criminal Division Chief Alice Fisher and New York state judge and former U.S. Attorney in Manhattan Michael Garcia."
The interviewers: AG Jeff Sessions and his deputy, Rod Rosenstein, who is set to appear before Congress next week.
Why you should pay attention: the past three short lists from Trumpworld — SCOTUS, VP and Michael Flynn's replacement — all included the eventual selection.
There's only one thing on the mind of Trumpland this week: the firing of FBI Director James Comey. It's saturated the news for the better part of a week — largely through POTUS' own special skill of keeping a single story on life support across multiple news cycles. So let's get the story straight on how everything went down and huddle amongst the bushes of Trumpland.
Democratic members of Congress and media publishers have focused on Comey's firing, while Facebook analytics showed that news stories about the firing didn't match up to the viral levels of other Trump controversies.
Approval: 39% of Americans approved of Trump firing Comey, compared to 46% disapproval, according to the Gallup Poll. Stories were quickly published of the Comey event threatening Trump's presidency, while Gallup has watched Trump's approval rating climb from 38% at the beginning of April to 42% this week.
Senate Intel committee ranking member Mark Warner (D-VA) told MSNBC Friday that former FBI Director James Comey will not be appearing before the committee next Tuesday, despite an invitation to speak with the committee behind closed doors.
That's after a day of intrigue following President Trump taunting Comey over the prospect of "tapes" from their conversations before the firing.
Still on the agenda: Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein has agreed to speak with the committee next week, date TBD.
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, the author of the memo that was — for a time — the basis for the firing of FBI Director James Comey, has agreed to brief the full Senate next week, though the date and time are still TBD, per a statement from Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer's office.
No word if the briefing will be open or closed, but expect Senate Dems to pounce on Comey's firing and attempt to gain momentum in their push for a special counsel for the Russia investigation.
Press Secretary Sean Spicer wouldn't deny that President Trump may have recorded his conversations with FBI Director James Comey. Spicer was repeatedly asked about Trump's Friday morning tweets, but continued to dodge questions by stating that "The president has nothing further to add on that" and that "the tweets speak for themselves." Other takeaways:
"Is [Trump] currently recording conversations taking place in the Oval Office?": "The president has no further comment on this."
Did Trump ask Comey to pledge his loyalty to him? "No. He was asked to pledge his loyalty to the country and rule of law," said Spicer.
On Trump saying he'd cancel the press briefings: "I think he is a little dismayed" over reporters' "attempt to parse every little word and make it more of a game of gotcha."
Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper appeared on NBC News' Andrea Mitchell Reports this afternoon, stating that "the morale in the FBI was very high" and that he views fired former FBI Director James Comey as "the consummate public servant."
He also broke down the hierarchy of his position as DNI, pushing back on Trump's tweet this morning and discussing in-depth how he purposely would not be aware of the FBI's Russia investigation or any of its findings:
President Trump's lawyers have released a letter stating that the last decade of his tax returns do not include "any income of any type from Russian sources," per the AP. The White House said the letter was in response to a request from Sen. Lindsey Graham regarding Trump's potential income from Russia.
Some exceptions: The letter notes that Trump received income from holding the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow as well as $95 million from a property sale to a Russian billionaire in 2008.
Blind trust: Without a release of Trump's returns, it's impossible to know with certainty if Trump's lawyers are presenting an accurate representation of his finances.
His six morning tweets, put together in one place:
Russia: "Again, the story that there was collusion between the Russians & Trump campaign was fabricated by Dems as an excuse for losing the election... When James Clapper himself, and virtually everyone else with knowledge of the witch hunt, says there is no collusion, when does it end?"
The media: "The Fake Media is working overtime today!"
Press briefings: "As a very active President with lots of things happening, it is not possible for my surrogates to stand at podium with perfect accuracy!.......Maybe the best thing to do would be to cancel all future "press briefings" and hand out written responses for the sake of accuracy???"
Jim Comey: "James Comey better hope that there are no "tapes" of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press!"
This morning, Trump used quotation marks for key words in two of his tweets:
"James Comey better hope that there are no "tapes" of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press!"
"...Maybe the best thing to do would be to cancel all future "press briefings" and hand out written responses for the sake of accuracy???"
Translation: Trump is aware nobody uses actual tapes to record conversations anymore and Spicer, Sanders and Trump don't actually brief the press.
It's a trend we first noticed in March, when Trump defended his wiretapping accusation on Fox. Here are other times Trump has used quote mark formulations in tweets in 2017.
Jan 3: The "Intelligence" briefing on so-called "Russian hacking" was delayed until Friday, perhaps more time needed to build a case. Very strange!
Jan 4: Jackie Evancho's album sales have skyrocketed after announcing her Inauguration performance.Some people just don't understand the "Movement"
Jan 6: Wow, the ratings are in and Arnold Schwarzenegger got "swamped" (or destroyed) by comparison to the ratings machine, DJT. So much for....
Jan 7: Having a good relationship with Russia is a good thing, not a bad thing. Only "stupid" people, or fools, would think that it is bad!
Jan 17: ... with the massive cost reductions I have negotiated on military purchases and more, I believe the people are seeing "big stuff."
Jan 24: If Chicago doesn't fix the horrible "carnage" going on, 228 shootings in 2017 with 42 killings (up 24% from 2016), I will send in the Feds!
Jan 30: If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad "dudes" out there!
Feb 3: Iran is playing with fire - they don't appreciate how "kind" President Obama was to them. Not me!
Feb 9: Chris Cuomo, in his interview with Sen. Blumenthal, never asked him about his long-term lie about his brave "service" in Vietnam. FAKE NEWS!
Feb 16: FAKE NEWS media, which makes up stories and "sources," is far more effective than the discredited Democrats - but they are fading fast!
Mar 2: ...is all of the illegal leaks of classified and other information. It is a total "witch hunt!"
Mar 4: Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my "wires tapped" in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!
Mar 7: For eight years Russia "ran over" President Obama, got stronger and stronger, picked-off Crimea and added missiles. Weak! @foxandfriends
Mar 15: Does anybody really believe that a reporter, who nobody ever heard of, "went to his mailbox" and found my tax returns? @NBCNews FAKE NEWS!
Mar 17: North Korea is behaving very badly. They have been "playing" the United States for years. China has done little to help!
(NOTE: This piece was originally published on March 18, 2017 and was updated to reflect the President's latest tweets.)
Frank Luntz, the Republican consultant and pollster (who can channel Trump partisans, but has also been critical of him), is quoted in the N.Y. Times ("Quote of the Day"!) on how people who are sympathetic to Trump believe he is once again being held to an unfair standard:
"In a word, they see him as their voice. And when their voice is shouted down, disrespected or simply ignored, that is an attack on them, not just an attack on Trump." — Frank Luntz
Takeaways from the p. A17 article by Jeremy Peters, "Resentful of Criticism, Conservatives Dig In in Defense of the President" (online: "For Trump Supporters, the Real Outrage Is the Left's Uproar Over Comey"),
"More clearly than other recent Trump-induced uproars, the reaction to the Comey firing illustrated how many conservatives now justify their defense of the president as part of a fight against a rising tide of overreaction and manufactured hysteria by the left. Mr. Trump ... has helped stoke those resentments."
"On Facebook, Republicans shared the 1993 C-Span footage of Bill Clinton's announcement that he had fired William S. Sessions, the only other F.B.I. director to be dismissed ... [H]e had abused his federally funded travel privileges."
"Erick Erickson, the writer and radio host who has called for an independent investigation, ... called the cries of constitutional crisis 'hysterics': 'Russiaism is the new Birtherism.'"
White House officials talk freely about putting "fences" around President Trump and his decision-making to protect him from his self-indulgent instincts.
The wall strategy has worked pretty well so far on national security. National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster demanded and got control of the National Security Council, and set up a process for keeping SecDef Mattis, SecState Tillerson and Homeland Security Secretary Kelly in the loop — and, as importantly, keeping others outside it.
Numerous White House officials tell us Trump has been dumping on his press shop for a sluggish defense of the Comey canning. He has raised replacing Sean Spicer in several conversations with insiders and outsiders.
Full disclosure: Spicer and I haven't always seen eye to eye. But it was not Spicer or his team that decided when and how to fire Comey, or to mislead the public by saying it driven by the recommendation of the deputy A.G. That was all Trump.
Despite the wall-to-wall media coverage, most Americans — according to Facebook interactions — cared less about James Comey being fired than other big moments so far in the Trump administration. SocialFlow evaluated the Facebook reach of articles on major flashpoints by more than 300 news organizations within a few days of the event. Here's what they found:
Data: SocialFlow; Chart: Andrew Witherspoon / Axios
President Trump's executive order on cybersecurity, signed on Thursday, was months in the making. It orders several broad reviews of the cybersecurity apparatuses of federal agencies, and pushes them to use a certain standards for managing their cybersecurity.
Why it matters: Federal agencies are fighting an uphill battle when it comes to data security. Most of them are using very old systems and have tight budgets, yet they are prime cyber-crime targets.
The loyalty pledge: The NYT reports that a week after taking office, Trump "summoned" Comey to the White House for a dinner in which he twice asked the FBI Director to promise to be loyal to him — and Comey declined. This tallies with earlier reports that Trump wanted and didn't receive an assurance of loyalty, and is shows the Comey camp clearly wants to get his side of the story out.
Russia on his mind: Trump told NBC's Lester Holt that before pulling the trigger on firing Comey he thought, "you know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made up story."
The U.S. and China issued a joint 10-point communiqué Thursday evening announcing "initial commitments" on trade affecting investment, financial services, energy, and agriculture. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross briefed reporters on the agreement, which includes an end to China's ban on U.S. beef imports.
The agreement is "underwhelming" and "mostly aspirational," an international trade expert tells Axios — note the language: the U.S. "welcomes China," China "may proceed," the U.S. "recognizes," the U.S. "remains committed," and so on. This leaves a lot of questions as to what weight this agreement will ultimately hold.
