Former FBI Director James Comey spoke a lot of words during his hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday, some of which were quite juicy.
He appeared before the committee to talk about what led to his firing by President Donald Trump, and had some choice words for the president (as well as a few others).
SEE ALSO: All hail James Comey's 'resting Comey face'Comey pulled no punches in his testimony.
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"Although the law required no reason at all to fire an FBI director, the administration then chose to defame me and, more importantly, the FBI, by saying the organization was in disarray, that it was poorly led, that the workforce had lost confidence in its leader. Those were lies, plain and simple."
Comey made it clear he didn't document conversations he had with President Barack Obama or President George W. Bush, but he did write down his conversations with Trump.
Why?
Warner: Why did you feel you had to start documenting Trump encounters? Comey: Sensitivity, I was alone with him 'and nature of the person.'
— CBC News Alerts (@CBCAlerts) June 8, 2017
OK!
After Trump fired Comey, the president tweeted that the former FBI director should be worried that tapes of their conversations may come to light.
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But Comey doesn't seem to worried.
"Lordy, I hope there are tapes," he said during the hearing.
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Comey opened up just a touch about the current and most recent attorneys general, showing he has viewed each with skepticism at one point or another.
Loretta Lynch, the attorney general during the 2016 presidential election, asked Comey to avoid the word "investigation" when talking about the FBI's investigation into Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server while she was secretary of state.
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"At one point the attorney general had directed me not to call it an 'investigation,' but instead to call it a 'matter,' which confused me and concerned me," Comey said.
In what may wind up being the most underrated noteworthy detail of the Comey hearing, the former FBI director said an...interesting thing about current Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
Comey was answering a question about why the FBI was confident that Sessions would recuse himself from investigating the relationship between the Trump campaign/administration and the Russian government.
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"Our judgement, as I recall, was that he was very close to and inevitably going to recuse himself for a variety of reasons," Comey said. And then... "We also were aware of facts that I can't discuss in an open setting that would make his continued engagement in a Russia-related investigation problematic."
Hhmmmmm...
Wonder what they're talking about in the afternoon closed-door hearing...
