Krauthammer: It Was a Bad Day for Both Trump & Comey

The former FBI director told the Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday that he was convinced that Trump fired him on May 9 because he refused to tamp down the Russian Federation investigation.

What is obstruction of justice? Lawmakers have the authority to decide whether interfering with a lawful investigation constitutes sufficient grounds for impeachment even if not for criminal prosecution.

He suggested that leaks by Mr Comey should themselves be investigated. For example, Sections 1503, 1505 and 1512 of Title 18 have variants of language making it a crime if someone corruptly “obstructs, influences or impedes any official proceeding”.

Beginning with Marco Rubio, who has conveniently forgotten the “Little Marco” slights of the 2016 primary campaign, Republicans repeatedly pressed Comey on his reluctance “to make a public statement that [Trump] was not under investigation”.

In theory, yes. Such statutes were broadly drafted. “I expect loyalty.” He emphasized what Comey had said, which is that Trump was not under investigation for colluding with the Russians. “This seems like a pretty light touch (from Trump)”, Lankford said.

Prosecutors do two things in building an obstruction case.

Your afternoon shot of politics, sent straight from the desk of Joshua Miller. The Supreme Court ordered Nixon to give up the tape, it provided a clear-cut case of obstruction of justice, and Nixon resigned three days later, in August 1974. Again, I don’t know him well enough to know how he reacted to that exactly.

But Comey grew increasingly frustrated over the White House’s shifting rationale for his firing, including an explanation that he’d been ousted due to decisions he made during the 2016 election concerning the FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server as secretary of state.

Asked about Comey saying Trump lied, Ryan called it a “he said, he said” situation. “Trump has made admissions about that”.

What impediments would there be to charging Trump? Comey said he wanted to spur the Justice Department to appoint a special counsel to take over the investigation.

Comey wrote that President Donald Trump said, “I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go”.

Motive and intent key to determing if obstruction of justice occurred. They are a “quasi-judicial, quasi-political process”, he noted; the House and the Senate determine for themselves whether the standards are met.

The other possible avenue is impeachment.

That makes prognostication an exercise in vote counting, not legal analysis.

Comey acknowledged leaking a memo detailing his interactions in an effort to speed the appointment of a special counsel, and thank goodness he did.

Rubio said that the committee had yet to hear a full accounting from Director of National Intelligence Daniel Coats or Adm. Mike Rogers, head of the National Security Agency, about whether Trump also asked them to pressure Comey to drop the FBI’s probe. “They’re coming after America, which I hope we all love equally”.

As a seasoned prosecutor he posed the question, “So why did he kick everybody out of the Oval Office?”

Comey responded, “He was very close to and inevitably going to recuse himself for a variety of reasons”. But when asked whether Trump’s actions amounted to obstruction of justice, he deferred to Mueller and his legal team.

“The easiest way to get out of that is if there are tapes to release them”, King said on CNN’s “360”.

“I was honestly concerned that he might lie about the nature of our meeting, and so I thought it really important to document”, he said of one such occasion.

Comey told senators he took Trump’s expression of “hope” as an order to comply.

There were cheers when Comey said, “This is about America, not about a particular party”.

“I don’t know. That’s Bob Mueller’s job to sort that out”, Comey responded, referring to the newly appointed special counsel who has taken over the Justice Department’s Russian Federation investigation.

“That is a very big deal, and not just because it involves me”.

The former head of the Federal Bureau of Investigation – testifying under oath – has called the president of the United States a liar.

After being fired, Comey said he was distressed to see the president mislead people about the circumstances that led to his termination. “As far as hacking, I think it was Russia“, Trump said, although he added: “It could have been others also”. The meetings described by Mr Comey were however “clearly inappropriate”, he said.

What is your understanding of the parameters of Attorney General Sessions’ recusal from the Russian Federation investigation?

Given that the House is now controlled by the Republican Party, few expect it to proceed against Trump as things stand.

No, according to experts on executive privilege, in part because Comey is no longer an administration official.