President Donald Trump believes “it’s not too late” to ask for James Comey’s resignation, but he indicated during a Tuesday interview on Fox Business Network that he doesn’t currently have plans to dismiss the FBI director.
“No, it’s not too late,” Trump said when Maria Bartiromo asked if it was too late to fire Comey. “But you know I have confidence in him. We’ll see what happens. It’s going to be interesting.”
Trump said he wanted to “give everyone a good, fair chance,” but also argued that Comey had “saved” his Democratic presidential opponent Hillary Clinton by not recommending any criminal charges related to her use of a private email server as secretary of state.
“Don’t forget, when Jim Comey came out, he saved Hillary Clinton,” Trump told Bartiromo. “People don’t realize that. He saved her life. I call it ‘Comey I.’ And I joke about it a little bit.”
Bartiromo also asked Trump why President Barack Obama reduced limits on the National Security Agency’s ability to share intercepted communications with the other intelligence agencies.
“I’m going to let you figure that one out. But it’s so obvious,” Trump replied. “When you look at Susan Rice and what’s going on and so many people coming up to me and apologizing, now they’re saying, ‘You know, you were right when you said that.’ Perhaps I didn’t know how right I was because nobody knew the extent of it.”
Rice, Obama’s former national security adviser, has been a target of attacks from conservative lawmakers and media outlets since reports surfaced alleging that she requested the unmasking of U.S. persons in intelligence reports that contained information about Trump transition staffers. Bartiromo asked if Trump had been referring to Rice in his infamous, and unsubstantiated, tweet accusing the former President of wiretapping Trump Tower.
“Well sure. We’re talking about surveillance,” Trump responded.
Watch part of the interview via Fox Business:
