Some big voices in the political media are framing the firing of ousted FBI Director James Comey as a “rush” to judgment by President Trump, even though it came almost four months after President Trump took office.
Comey was fired Tuesday night after Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein recommended his termination because of his public conduct as they related to the investigations into Hillary Clinton’s email controversies. Rosenstein said that he should be replaced with someone who can “implement the necessary corrective actions,” and said the FBI’s credibility had “suffered substantial damage” under Comey’s leadership.
But even though Comey remained in his position for months, under fire from critics on the Left and Right who called for his resignation, some in the media are charging that there was a “rush” to terminate him.
Wednesday on MSNBC, Journalist and NBC News analyst Mark Halperin asked White House spokesperson Sarah Sanders why there was an “urgency” to oust Comey.
Sanders said Rosenstein’s case against Comey was “clear” and “compelling” enough that there was “no reason to wait and sit around and debate” the issue.
In his morning newsletter, well-known Washington journalist Mike Allen of Axios listed 10 questions “we’d like answered.” The second one was, “Why the rush to get rid of Comey?”
A report Wednesday by the Daily Beast said there was “a sudden rush” to fire Comey.
Comey had previously acknowledged that the FBI was investigating whether there was any collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign, but Comey made that public more than a month ago, and Democrats and news outlets have been calling for his resignation since even before that.
Ed Rogers, a Republican and Washington Post blogger, wrote in January, before Trump was sworn in, that it’s “probably best for Comey to resign.”
The Wall Street Journal’s right-leaning editorial board also in January called for Comey to resign.
Michael Mukasey, who served as attorney general in the George W. Bush administration, said the same month that the FBI “crossed several lines” in its investigation of Clinton’s emails and that Comey “probably” should resign.
Syndicated conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer said on Fox News in January that Comey had “lost the confidence of everybody” and should “simply resign.”
On ABC’s “This Week” in January, former Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders said, “I think it would not be a bad thing for the American people if he did step down.”
In November, two days before the election, Democratic Rep. Steve Cohen of Tennessee called, again, for Comey to resign.
