Despite the “Comey Letter,” which released new evidence against Hillary Clinton days before the 2016 election and is seen as having helped Donald Trump win that election, Trump has been feuding with former FBI director James Comey for years.
After demanding “loyalty” from Comey, especially in the early days of his first presidency, Trump fired Comey from the FBI in the spring of 2017. Comey then emerged as a Trump critic, testifying before Congress and writing a book, with Trump frequently ranting against his former FBI director.
This week, Comey was indicted on charges of making a false statement and obstruction of a congressional proceeding. The indictment arrived days after Trump publicly demanded he face charges. He had even fired the previous U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, after that prosecutor reportedly refused to indict Comey or another Trump enemy, New York attorney general Letitia James.
At issue is the testimony before Congress that Comey delivered in 2020, in which he stated, per NBC News, that he “did not authorize leaking information regarding the FBI’s investigations into President Donald Trump or former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.”
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The indictment came days before the statute of limitations was to expire.
Trump ranted about Comey on Truth Social on Friday:
“Whether you like Corrupt James Comey or not, and I can’t imagine too many people liking him, HE LIED! It is not a complex lie, it’s a very simple, but IMPORTANT one,” Trump said on the social network.
“There is no way he can explain his way out of it. He is a Dirty Cop, and always has been, but he was just assigned a Crooked Joe Biden appointed Judge, so he’s off to a very good start. Nevertheless, words are words, and he wasn’t hedging or in dispute. He was very positive, there was no doubt in his mind about what he said or meant by saying it. He left himself ZERO margin of error on a big and important answer to a question. He just got unexpectedly caught.”
Much doubt has been raised about the strength of the case. Andrew McCarthy of National Review said on Fox News Friday that the indictment “seems to be premised on something that’s not true, which is that McCabe said that Comey authorized him to leak to the Wall Street Journal … I don’t see how they can make that case.”
Andrew McCarthy to Maria Bartiromo on Comey indictment: “I don’t think there’s a case … it seems to be premised on something that’s not true, which is that McCabe said that Comey authorized him to leak to the Wall Street Journal … I don’t see how they can make that case.” pic.twitter.com/PrSg6YBSOL
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) September 26, 2025
Photo courtesy of the Political Tribune media library.
