James Comey, the FBI director fired by President Trump whose leaked memos helped spark a special counsel investigation, won’t take a full-time job until after 2020 because he wants to be free to speak up about Trump.
Comey joined Josh Campbell, his former special assistant at the FBI and now a CNN legal analyst, to discuss Campbell’s new book Crossfire Hurricane: Inside Donald Trump’s War on the FBI during a book launch event at George Washington University on Monday. The book is a broad defense of Comey and of the DOJ’s and the FBI’s actions in 2016 and 2017.
Comey also briefly opened up during the discussion about his plans for the 2020 presidential election.
“We’re in a weird state now because I won’t commit to anything full time until next year’s election because I need to be free to speak, so I’m in a little bit of a state of suspended animation,” Comey said. “I can’t go lead a nonprofit or take a prominent position somewhere else, because I need to be able to speak.”
Comey has regularly criticized Trump on Twitter since his firing. Earlier this summer, Comey tweeted that “with our voices and our 2020 votes, we must send Donald Trump and his mob back to their dark corner.” And in the wake of Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s report in August on Comey’s mishandling of his memos on conversations with Trump, Comey tweeted, “I don’t need a public apology from those who defamed me, but a quick message with a ‘sorry we lied about you’ would be nice.”
Horowitz’s 83-page report harshly criticized Comey’s decision to remove his memos from the FBI after he was fired. Comey testified in 2017 that he hoped leaking this information “might prompt the appointment of a special counsel.” Horowitz made it clear it was unacceptable for Comey to use official FBI documents to advance his own goals, but the DOJ declined to charge Comey.
Comey was scrutinized by Horowitz in his investigation into allegations of abuse of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which wrapped up last week.
