A Conversation with Former FBI Director James Comey | Washington Post Live

[Applause] good morning everybody I'm Carol Leonard I'm an investigative reporter at The Washington Post welcome to all of you I'd like to introduce my guest for today who really doesn't need any introduction but former FBI director James Comey who we will be referring to today as Jim and his book a higher loyalty truth lies and leadership and the response to it from all corners generated headlines for nearly a month and hopefully will make some headlines today as well I want to let our audience in the room and those watching online know that you can tweet your questions to us using the hashtag post live I will pose some of them to the director later in our interview so let's get started Jim in your book you write that good people have to call it out when we see truth endangered when we see lying it's it's really a call to action to public servants in my mind in my reading it's a version of see something say something you've said the president said things to you that you found deeply inappropriate and troubling his pressure about the investigation his request that others leave the room when he wanted to speak to you his his pressure for your loyalty and yet you say you didn't confront him my question is if you as the FBI director can't say something to correct the president to to to manage your boss how can career bureaucrats serving in the government today and in the future step out and say something when they witness impropriety or a crossing of the red line well depends on what their job is and what their avenues for addressing what they think is misconduct what what available avenues there are and in my situation my judgment was I'm trying to stay in a role for another six years protect and represent an institution and so I need to find it a to both build a relationship with the president and make sure that the appropriate distance and conduct lines are abided and there's no way to do that perfectly and I'm sure that I didn't but each person in their role has to decide so what have I seen and what are the opportunities and avenues for me to address that and so difficult to answer beyond that sort of general answer and I think I hear you saying that part of it was wanting to stay in the job and protect the institution sure I mean I'm standing there in the first five months of a president's tenure where I expect to be there for at least his first full four years and then beyond and so how do you protect the institution build a relationship that you have to have with the senior leaders of the executive branch and also make sure that nothing improper goes on you kept a series of memos you began keeping a record of your conversations with the president and his actions what was the first incident that led you to write that first memo to to self the first memo was actually done for the benefit of my colleagues the directors of NSA CIA and the DNI because I was in part recording what had happened in a private session that we had planned for me to have and so that one was less an aide to memoir and more classified briefing for the others there related to related to the Trump Tower where we briefed the President on the findings of the intelligence community assessment and so part of that was trying to protect myself and the FBI but a big part of it was making a record for the others so they knew what had happened but after that when I had encounters with the president especially the dinner that we had on the 27th of January and we were touching on things that affected the FBI and me personally affected him personally and we were alone I thought then I have to be able to remember this in detail someday and so that's when I really began the process of what I thought of as the almost a personal memo diary what did you expect you would use them for and did you anticipate or guess that the president would be under criminal investigation I expected that I why that I would never use them that they'd never be necessary that there would never come a time when his account of something would be different than mine and but I knew that could happen which is why I wanted it now the second question did I imagine the president might be under criminal investigation sure in fact that was at the core of the advice a little news yeah well the reason I say that is I was under the the among the advice I recount in my book was the general counsel the FBI Jim Baker when we were discussing whether I could go to that very first encounter with him with the you're not under we're not investigating you personally in my back pocket his advice was look that's problematic because inevitably a look at whether there was a connection between the campaign and Russia is gonna touch him in some way and and so that's a slippery slope in a way that you ought to be careful about so we discussed it and contemplated the possibility very early on okay so you say in your book as well that lying has become normalized in our political culture are you specifically speaking about the president and did he ever lie to you and about what I am speaking about the president but I'm also speaking about the normalization happens when someone lies constantly at the head of the government and then we all become numb to it or imitated and the lie to you oh there were quite a few actually I mean during the initial dinner he told me at the beginning of the dinner that his chief of staff didn't know we were having dinner which struck me as odd and at the end of the dinner he said he knows we're having dinner and so follow up with him and he went through for example that he had the largest inauguration crowd in history those sorts of things the casual lies that have become a part of that that struck you that he lied about that you knew not to be true not that I knew for sure wasn't true at that point but the normalization I'm worried about is that I feel even at myself that I described as my reaction to his tweet saying I should be in jail my reaction is almost a shrug like yeah there he goes again but that's a numbness that's dangerous agreed speaking of tweets you have a lot of insight into the investigation some of which you can't share with us some of us some of which you can the president repeatedly tweets and says that there's no evidence that he or his campaign was engaged in any collusion when you see his tweets and his comments no collusion never what do you think first I wonder how the word collusion has found its way into our lives I don't know what it means it's not a legal term and second it's just it's always struck me as strange that's whenever someone continually denies something it makes me interested and so his continual denial of something that's being investigated by some of the best people in the country is strange is he lying well that's for director Muller to figure out what do you think I think I'll let director Muller figure that out you spoken truth to power in your book what is your advice to people who feel frightened about speaking truth you know what I'm going to skip that one because you addressed it a little bit before a few days ago two of your former top advisors in the FBI resigned Lisa Paige and James Baker good careers do you know why they resigned only with respected Jim Jim was the top adviser to me to me Lisa Paige was a relatively junior lawyer who reported to the Deputy Attorney General and Jim was asked to step out of the general counsel role the new director which is not a typical wanted a his own general counsel and so Jim I knew was gonna look for the next thing and he found something he really wanted to do he loves artificial intelligence and its application to the national security space so he's gonna focus on that at Brookings Lisa page I don't know since I'm not in touch with her but Jim is of both a friend and a colleague of mine did you ever consider resigning before you were fired no and in fact everything that was going on made me more committed to staying to try to protect the institution it's been said that the president is incredibly new to politics in fact sometimes completely tone-deaf to how politics works and and how government works is it possible that maybe the Department of Justice and you yourself could have given him more benefit of the doubt more guidance more instruction early on that could have helped him possible in one sense and not possible in another it it's fair to ask did he know the norms and traditions at the core of especially the interaction between the Justice Department in the White House and so it's possible that we could have tried to offer more instruction I'll come to that in a second but given the nature of the person he's utterly uninterested in you telling him things about how he should do his job and so it's not possible in a practical way I encountered this when I was first asked for oil tea at the beginning of our dinner and before he came back - at the end of the dinner I tried to interject a couple times to explain how it should work and I don't think he was particularly interested in that did he turn red face - what was your signal that this was not interesting to him just no follow up like what do you mean by that or how would that work kind of thing and and then returning to the question of loyalty told me that he clearly heard what I said but didn't really care what I said it was about this personal transactional loyalty in your book you also talked a little bit about what I find really interesting the beginning of your career as a prosecutor and you write as a young person in 1987 working for some know someone no other than Rudy Giuliani I'm gonna read this passage for the benefit of people who maybe don't remember this from the book or haven't read it yet Giuliani had extraordinary confidence and as a young prosecutor I found his brash style exciting which was part of what drew me to his office I loved it that my boss was on magazine covers standing on the courthouse steps with his hands on his hips as if he ruled the world it fired me up kut'rs almost never saw the great man in person so I was especially pumped when he stopped by my office early in my career rudy giuliani recently called you a baby and other other things for defending FBI agents when he described them as stormtroopers how do you feel about the America's mayor and the president's lawyer today if your feelings changed I have a different sense of it than in 1987 could you be more expansive well first the reason I I tell that story is that because it's true I was fired up and thought it was exciting to work for Rudy and it was it wasn't until I tried to become a leader myself that I saw some of the the the underside of that confidence which was it wasn't leavened with a whole lot of humility which is really important to being a leader to have that balance and so I use him almost as a counterpoint in the book and compare him to another US Attorney I work for named Helen Fahey who had this remarkable balance of confidence and humility so my view is him of him as a leader changed over time and the the name-calling and whatnot that and I don't know what's going on with that honestly I said to some of the other day I guess the love is gone I used to be one of his star prosecutors it appears up not anymore but I don't know what that's about all right this thank you this weekend Giuliani also said that President Trump may not sit down with Robert Muller because you could be lying I think his exact quote was could call me be lying you're goddamn right he could be lying I'm not going to walk into that trap is tell me what your reaction is to that this is a former US Attorney a member of the bar and a mentor at one point what do you make of him saying that you're possibly lying actually it doesn't hurt my feelings and I don't mean that facetiously it of course everybody could be lying and so the question you have to ask yourself is so what do I make of this person in their account is it consistent over time was it contemporaneously recorded what is their track record all the things that help you evaluate other person is telling the truth but I'm also not sure of the intersection between an assessment of me and a decision about whether to sit down with a special prosecutor I don't quite follow that I'm gonna switch for a moment to the Hillary Clinton probe I was hoping you would it's it's still riveting to many in our in our democracy Secretary Clinton's decision to set up an email server in her home for official business has infuriated her fans and her detractors many agreed it was a self-inflicted wound that only increased the perception that she viewed herself as above the law above the rules what do you think were the factors in government and in the political culture that allowed someone to do something that was so beyond the rules that's a really good question and and I don't know because we didn't investigate her leadership style but to me at least raises the prospect that she hadn't created a culture around herself as a leader where people would tell her when she's full of it and it's really important as a leader to do that and so I've often wondered so why didn't anyone around her say hey knock that off you can't do that boss was it easy in your investigation was there anyone who who tried to counsel her not to do this not that I'm aware of and were there a lot of enablers in your investigation I don't think it's fair to say in a blurs but I didn't see any indication of the kind of leadership culture that I really hope and try to create around myself where people tell me when I'm full of crap and didn't see any indication of that and would have expected to frankly if it was a healthy leadership culture around that person but again the the problem in her situation was not that her email instead of being on Gmail or on AOL her email or on the State Department sudden class system was on her own domain that really wasn't the problem the problem was that she was using a ton class system to talk about stuff that shouldn't be talked about on class system true and not preserving government records as required right but that wasn't the focus of the criminal esta gation the criminal investigation was about was was classified information mishandled absolutely so were you or your FBI agents ever warned or provided information that suggested that foreign governments particularly China had access to her emails it was a serious concern of ours for reasons I can't get into but we never found the evidence the technical indicators that there was penetration by an adversary of this of that system were you warned by FBI employees or agents investigators that there were in dish' that china was reading her emails no there were reasons again that I can't get into here that we were concerned that it might have happened but we couldn't find the trail that established that any foreign adversary had got into her server there were indications on the periphery of the people she was in contact with but we couldn't track it to the server itself okay your decision to hold a press conference in July 2016 about the Hillary Clinton server provided really great insight I remember thinking it was great television but great insight into prosecutors decision making it also disappointed many Justice Department officials alumni people who who think of you well because you did not follow the rule that a prosecutor only speaks the general rule that a prosecutor only speaks to their charges you explained Clinton had been extremely careless but would not be charged for her use of this email system why did you decide to hold that press conference what was the single most important reason because the credibility of the institution turned upon the American people having confidence that the work was done independently and competently and at the best way not the only way the best way to achieve that maintain that credibility would be with transparency which is you said I agree with you totally the normal rule is you don't talk on an investigation that closes without charges except when the interests of Justice require it which the department justice has long done when it really matters Ferguson it really mattered to explain why there was no case there against the officer who'd killed Michael Brown the tea party targeting alleged targeting by the IRS it really mattered to assure people with great detail of why there was no case there and to my mind this was that kind of case what made this different is not that because I think the announcement itself is contemplated by the policy it's that I'd never heard of the FBI director doing it separate from the Attorney General and that was the other big consideration is that the normal in that situation would have been the Attorney General making the announcement I made and for reasons that I've talked about a lot and people may be sick of hearing I thought it really important to try to protect the institution by separating from the Attorney General and on that point for those who haven't I mean I'm not bored by it by the way at all but Loretta Lynch you know had this tarmac meeting with President Clinton which you can see the President Clinton in you know initiated but she received and that that created for you the perception that this could be tainted did you ever I think your answer to this is no did you ever confront or alert Loretta Lynch to your concern about this perception about her meeting no before I even saw her as this controversy started to explode that last I guess is last week of June she made a public announcement that surprised me saying that she would not step aside but would accept my recommendation and that of the career prosecutors and so it was at that point I thought I I love her I've known her a long time I've got to step away from her if the American people are gonna believe that this was done as it was in an independent way in a competent way so at that point didn't make any she's made a public announcement I'm not gonna step aside I don't know what good it would do at that point to go to my boss and say you've stuck me here do you think in hindsight you wish you'd talked to her at all that's a great question I think in hindsight it's probably too late I wish we'd had an opportunity to talk before she announced she was not going to recuse herself because we might have lived a different future if she had stepped out in Sally Yates who also had a great relationship with had become the acting Attorney General because I could imagine myself standing next to Sally and having Sally make the announcement I don't think any of that would make a difference for any of us in terms of what happened in October we were gonna get stuck because of Anthony Weiner in October regardless but but it might have played out differently in terms of how we announced it if I'd had a chance to really sit down with her before she said I wouldn't work use herself she won't refuse herself this question will seem harsh but I know you can take it early you talked about the importance of humility in this instance and in others you place your decision-making above the Attorney General above the president what should people watching you think about your level of humility that your decision-making is superior it's not it's not a tough I mean it's an appropriate question I don't think it's unduly tough and really a reasonable question I hope what they'll do is look at how the decisions were made and why and that I don't think a fair-minded person if you stare at that can come way thinking this was about me being the star of this show somehow first the decisions were made by a big group of smart people fighting about it and that the decisions were made because of the institutional interests that were implicated by the situation's we found ourselves in and and I knew how much this was going to suck for me I mean if anybody thinks this was a way to shine your own Apple you're out of your mind but but we really felt like if we're if we're if we believe in the values we talked about then this is the way we have to do it but it's a totally fair question the Washington Post reported we're gonna get to October now who another instance show blood The Washington Post reported that you first learned about the information on anthony Weiner's laptop new Clinton emails in late September early October this was confirmed with some of your top people and yet it wasn't until October 28th dangerously close to the election for any prosecutor when you decided to disclose this in a letter to Congress you said your reasoning for disclosing these emails was because you thought concealment was disaster too important to keep this under wraps how did that news about the new Clinton emails not set off alarm bells in late September early October for you yeah I I don't know exactly and because I can't remember clearly how it was first mentioned to me I think it was the first week of October somebody said something that there might be a connection between Anthony Weiner and the Clinton emails and I think the reason I don't remember it clearly is how could that possibly be right Anthony Weiner it's a sex case how could that have anything do with Hillary Clinton and so I just don't remember focusing on it and I'm sure I assumed that if it means something someone will come and tell me about it and and so if I had indexed on it and then they came and told me about it in great detail in the 27th of October if I'd indexed on it the way I did on the 27th the first week of October I'm sure I would have reacted in a similar way which is we've got to understand what this is but I don't I don't remember knowing about it and in that level of detail and I don't know exactly why one of things I write in the book is because I can't go back and interview my former colleagues at the FBI and I'm hoping the IG will Inspector General will lay all this out what was going on during those few weeks why did it take from the beginning of October to the 27th of October to sit down with the director and say look here's what we have I just don't know the answer to that during this time period there were press inquiries there were rumors that agents were going to leak this information because they felt that the agency wasn't moving to reopen it or wasn't moving in the weeks before the election how much of a pressure point was that for you or your deputies I don't remember that being a pressure point at all like you would think it would cut the other way we make things move faster and I do remember that last full week of October like Rudy Giuliani in particular on TV saying something was coming I had no idea what he was talking about and that makes sense cuz I think he said that on the 26th of October it's the 27th when I get briefed on it and I still don't know to this day whether he was actually getting information from inside the FBI but the prospect of a leak was actually not a factor in the decision I made on the 28th to notify Congress Loretta Lynch and I subsequent had a conversation about that where she said would they feel better if it leaked on the 4th of November but it wasn't the reason that I made the decision you asked Loretta if she'd feel better if it leaked on November 4th so she asked me she was because we've known each other a long time she was consoling me on the morning of October 31st and gave me a hug which is awkward when you're hugging a giraffe but it was she gave me a hug which is a wonderful thing and I think she could tell I needed it and then she said would they feel better if it leaked on November the 4th and I said exactly Loretta and I think what she was saying to me was your decision actually wasn't that important right because had you not told Congress that we'd gotten a search warrant somebody would have told somebody and it would have come out later on a sealed search warrant yes ok I'm gonna skip to the money question which is many Democrats feel that you did this to protect yourself and to protect from looking bad later when ultimately this was about unverified material that was under investigation that lots of prosecutors don't discuss and the result was it threw the election to Donald Trump what do you say to that I can't well they say that but I hope what they'll do is imagine themselves sitting where we sat on October 28th and tell me what you would do and because you only had two choices then you got to remember the investigative team has come to the leadership of the FBI and said there are hundreds of thousands of Hillary Clinton's emails on Anthony Weiner's laptop for reasons we can't explain and we think there may be the missing emails from her first three months of Secretary of State when she was using a blackberry and we had never found those emails any of the blackberry emails and so if there was ever gonna be evidence that she knew had been told don't do this it would likely be there and so you've got the investigative team saying not only do we need to reopen this our result may change and so the question I'd ask people is so what do you do and I only saw two options I could speak about it and tell Congress what I had said under oath repeatedly was no longer true or I could conceal that fact both of those are horrible options one more horrible than the other speaking is horrible bad really bad concealing is catastrophic in my view because think of what will happen to the institutions of Justice if you hide from the American people that you know something they relied upon is a lie now that they can move on there's nothing there which do you choose I don't think you choose the catastrophic option I think you got to choose the really bad option but people could disagree but what I'd ask people to do is you got to come to that day and say so what would I do and why and the notion that it's about protecting myself doesn't make any sense to me because if I was about protecting myself what I would have done is written a memo to the direct to the Attorney General and the Deputy Attorney General saying over to you and and I don't know what they would have done at that point part of me thinks they would have had to do what I did and but you feared what they would choose you chose no this is different actually I actually gave them the chance to make the decision I had my chief of staff informed their Chiefs of Staff saying the director thinks that he has to notify Congress about this but he would welcome your input and the response was we think it's a bad idea but we don't wish to speak to him and my reaction that was okay and I was tempted as I said in the book I was actually tempted in a moment say you know what tell them I've decided that it's their decision just to see what they would do or I've decided I'm not gonna say anything and see what they would do but I thought that's cowardly right you're the director of the FBI you have a responsibility institution to act in its interests and so I really don't think this was in my personal interest I think you have to be a little nuts to think that but I think it was in the institution's interest and the only way to save the institution because of what would happen at an institution even no matter who's elected president Hillary Clinton's elected president you have concealed from the American people a hugely material fact and she would be in some by some lights an illegitimate president the moment she's elected Donald Trump's elected president the FBI acted to try and help his opponent by concealing the fact that you'd restarted the investigation either of those in my judgment is a catastrophic outcome for the institutions now that you've seen the result do you feel sort of damned if you do damned if you don't you're now viewed as the person who helped elect President Trump and before you are worried about looking like you elected an illegitimate Hillary Clinton sure yeah and I knew that coming in one of the things I recount in the book 2015 when this thing came in the investigation my deputy looked at me and said you know you're totally screwed right and and I smiled and said yep nobody gets out alive and what I thought he meant was one half of the partisan divide will hate you I'd never imagined as my wife says you could piss off both halves of the partisan divide but you know again there's something freeing about being stuck in a situation where you know you're screwed and it sort of relieved that we have a lot of questions going actually you got me to get off of being on YouTube you teed one of them up very nicely but we'll get to it in a second you talked about smart people fighting that's essentially your your your console Ares did anyone counsel you don't do this did any of your clothes deputy's subordinates peers say don't do it Jim no well there's two it's we debated a lot the closer question was whether to do the press conference in this in July the fifth and there no one we sort of took a poll at the end we have this robot up to this family environment we've fought about things we argued it we argued against our arguments and then everybody at the end said no this is the right thing to do there were a couple of least one advisor said 5149 input 51 in favor of doing the press conference believe it or not the the discussion which we had over served 24 hours in October was less close because everybody after we debated it for a while saw the divide between Diaz speaker 2 your concealed as concealing would be disastrous and so the group no one voted against doing it one person in the group voted against once we to my surprise finish the investigation before the election one person said we shouldn't notify Congress that we've finished but other than that that everybody saw it after a lot of debate the same way and you mentioned you would never have imagined that you would draw a fire from both sides how does that feel actually to be a lightning rod and such a controversial figure I don't love it honestly it's yeah it's painful and and the notion that I had an impact on the election that we had an impact on the election is really painful and and so yeah it is and but it and what consoles you is you look back and ask so did we have forget the decisions did we have the right process to arrive at sound decisions and honestly we did and and so there's it's just weird things on the one hand it's very painful to everybody a lot of people angry at you on the other side you look back and say well we had the right process and even in hindsight I think we made the right decisions and so it's both off-putting and piece of it is consoling if that makes any sense on that note we're gonna go to Russia I'm delightful last Friday the House Intelligence Committee released an unredacted section of its final Russia report it says that FBI agents never really believed that Michael Flynn was lying about his conversation with Ambassador kis lyac you'll remember this is the conversation where they talked about sanctions and he indicated to agents that they did not rather the agents felt that he was confused did general Flynn tell agents interviewing him that his conversation with Ambassador kis lyac was likely recorded and that they should review that tape I don't remember as I sit here the this bit in the House report about the FBI not believing believing he had been confused or not testified falsely I don't know where that's coming from really that was never my sense and never the sense of the agents who interviewed him okay did the Justice Department misstep in any way by prosecuting Michael Flynn in because he appeared to be saying to people hey I don't remember it exactly go look at the tape it shows sort of a lack of intent to lie if he said such a thing he pled guilty and allocute er which means explained to the court why I'm guilty and I did this knowing it was wrong I mean many of you ever sat in a court listen to what's called the rule 11 colloquy where the judge makes sure that you're guilty people how to get that transcript this will sound funny coming from a federal court reporter an old court reporter but is it possible to plead guilty to something that's the lesser lesser charge when you're implicated and maybe some other things that are more worrisome and that lesser lesser charge isn't something that you actually believe you're guilty of is it possible sure it's possible yeah so I can't say it never happens but strikes me as a very very very very unlikely prospect here okay last week the federal and everyone this is right out of the news the federal judge overseeing the case on Paul manna for the former campaign chairman for Donald Trump's campaign suggested that Robert Muller the special counsel and his team were only interested in going after Trump so they could gain information to ultimately write a report recommending impeaching the president do you think that's the case I guess I find that very very very hard to believe and I don't know how a federal judge could possibly know enough about an investigation given that federal judges aren't involved in investigations at all to offer a view like that so let me break that sentence in part do you think it's accurate knowing as you do how to prosecute a case so well that the real goal here is to squeeze Paul Manafort to cooperate in the probe and that there's not really great interest in his bank fraud as much as there is in cooperating with robert muller impossible for me to say from the outside there's all kinds of goals and they're not inconsistent in criminal investigation and prosecution you obviously want to bring wrongdoers to account but if possible you know let's say you're working a corporate fraud case you want to get the the chief financial officer if he's been involved in criminal wrongdoing but you also would like to know what the truth is from him about others in the company and so they're not inconsistent goals and I would hope every prosecutor when they prosecute a defendant wants to know does he know things that could bring other people to account do you although you emphasize you don't know do you expect that this will end with impeachment proceedings I don't know I really don't and I I hope that that the president and those around him will let Bob Muller and his people find the truth I don't know what the truth will be I mean it's that may sound strange coming from me the truth may be that they don't find evidence that the president engaged in criminal conduct of any kind but I don't really care what the truth is so long as we find it and and I would hope that if you're president United States you approach it in a similar way that's what the rule of law depends upon you wrote that you found it remarkable the president would not say anything derogatory about Vladimir Putin even in private it really struck you what did it make you think about the likelihood that the Russian government had compromising or worrisome information about Donald Trump the candidate it's one of the factors that led me to conclude something I never thought I'd conclude that it's possible I wouldn't say likely but possible that they had something like that and did information come to you not confirmed evidence but in information come to you that there were investigative leads of that nature yeah that's when I can't answer I could I'm not permitted to answer President Trump insists that there's no evidence that that he or his campaign have ever colluded I know you don't like the word collusion what links and contacts between Trump's inner circle and the Russian government or Russian nationals really shocked you have to give you the same answer there I haven't talked about in the book or any interviews what I learned or knew during that investigation and I need to stick to that but some of them have become public can i press you wonder of course I think that a lot of interactions have become known there were at least you know now for people who have agreed acknowledged or been charged and had some contact with Russian nationals any of them strike you as surprising worrisome more worrisome than the others Carter page George papadopolis Paul Manta Ford Rick Gates may be the only one out coming on because it is public is the Papadopoulos encounter because it's also public now that that was the predication for the opening of the FBI's investigation when the FBI learned in late July from an allied government that Papadopoulos had been in contact with a Russian cutout a Russian representative to discuss obtaining dirt the Russians had on Hillary Clinton and that conversation occurred months before it became public that the Russians were actually dumping stolen emails in an effort to hurt Hillary Clinton that's a really important fact and was certainly ample justification to open an investigation to understand whether there's a connection between Americans and the Russian effort probably all I can say how important a fact is it that political consultant Roger stone told close friends that he in April of 2016 was aware that WikiLeaks had obtained a series of emails that would be damaging to Hillary also long before it was publicly known how important a fact is that to you yeah that's one I'm not gonna answer okay you've had so much experience director Comey or Jim as we were referring to you now as an investigator a prosecutor and a defense lawyer if you were the president's lawyer right now which I'm sure it would be hard for you to imagine but if you were his lawyer right now what would you advise him to do and I don't just mean tell the truth I don't know what my advice would be and I ought not to offer any anytime you're representing a client you have to consider what's the prospect that they won't tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth in an interview with federal investigators and again it doesn't matter whether you're on under oath or not if you lied to federal investigators that's a separate offense so you have to weigh that consideration against other considerations like what is your job you're the CEO of a public company are you in a place where you really can refuse to cooperate with the SEC for example we're looking at your company and what are the consequence ik wences of that let me try another way is he the kind of client knowing him as you do and having as much interaction as you have that you would recommend he sit down with Robert Muller you'd have to be very thoughtful about that given that your client is not somebody well is somebody who lies a lot and so you'd have to that doesn't mean you you don't do it and and and I actually believe as an American it's very important that the president cooperate with a an appropriate lawful disciplined federal investigation that touches on things of which he has material knowledge but you'd have to as the lawyer be very thoughtful about that and prepare your client to understand that this is one you cannot be as your way through you must tell the truth did you have any inkling or idea that the stormy Daniels case would spiral in the way that it has and become part of a federal investigation in the Southern District into possible illegal campaign contributions and do you view it as even more perilous for the president than the Russia investigation I don't know enough to give you a thoughtful answer as in stormy Daniels news seems to be everywhere but I don't know it well enough to give you a thoughtful answer and any advice you'd give client Trump about how to handle stormy Daniels definitely I wouldn't give it but I'm not giving advice about how to handle Muller unless mahlet stormy Daniels that's a sentence I never thought I would speak all kinds of firsts in our lives some you can laugh about we have talked a lot about lying and I'm gonna ask you a question is there anything you feel that you weren't completely honest about in the course of this not this interview in the course of this experience the Clinton administration the I'm sorry the Clinton investigation and the Trump administration is there anything you feel you've left out no okay no and I look as I write in the book I've lied at times in my life I guess we all do in some respects I because I no longer have to go to Capitol Hill and say senator it's good to be with you but but no I don't want to leave the Russian investigation but I better get to this in my one minute the Department of Justice's Inspector General has been looking deeply into the handling of the Clinton email investigation and some other matters and is poised to issue a report and already has issued some materials that have cast a cloud on your deputy that have raised questions about political bias among some of your aides how have you felt about those revelations about the agency the internal talk about Donald Trump that was extremely disparaging and the unpleasant attention they brought to the purity of the FBI or the purity you say the FBI upholds both terrible and great terrible in the sense that it's incredibly painful to see people exhibiting appalling judgment criticizing first of all having an affair using FBI devices to communicate and in the course of communicating bad-mouthing not just Donald Trump but everybody as near as I can tell and so that's really bad and part of the terrible is painful the part about handy mccabe has been painful and because I like him very much but the great part is that's what an institution looks like that cares about the truth it cares about accountability and just to put it on the spectrum you feel he made mistake who Andy I'm not the judge in his case but it certainly looks from the IG report like he's a good person did something that was not only a mistake but was wrong and that's what it looks like though an institution cares about the truth you investigate you hold people accountable I don't know what the IG is gonna say about me I'm confident they'll say I've told the truth but they may criticize me okay that's what it is I encourage that investigation because I want an independent watchdog to look at the hardest decisions we've made that's great it's been said that you in your most recent interview with the Inspector General that you were not tickled by some of the questions they posed to you how did you feel about that most recent interview with the IG I don't remember an IG interview is a little bit like your annual physical or or your visit to the dentist so you're never tickled but I don't remember I don't even remember I don't remember seeing news accounts of that I don't remember being put off by any of their questions and how do you feel that they'll treat you in their report I don't know in terms of the results I'm highly confident that with respect to the handling of my memos that that there's no significant issue there of any kind with respect to how I made my decisions in the Clinton case I think they'll find they were made thoughtfully and deliberately whether they agree with them whether they agree with the view that it was a 500-year flood and we made decisions in the best interest the institution not I don't know they might they might bang me for decisions and have a different view of it but what I care about is the process and I respect that process a great deal okay last question what's next for Jim Comey you know you're wearing such an attractive pockets Clank you for that there'll tell tells me that you're no longer in your old line of work what are you gonna no tie no time oh it's so liberating I am teaching starting in August and I have a class already of 30 students signed up at a three credit class which is no joke to teach about leadership and ethics at the College of William and Mary and then I'm gonna travel around a lecture at universities and other places about leadership and what's gonna be your recommendation Jim Comey about how we fix the divide of our country and the lack of surety uncertainty in our democracy our norms are even the accuracy of our news coverage my small part I hope will be driving us all to elevate the conversation above the things we fight about every day guns immigration taxes and realize that actually what we have in common is above that and that's a common set of values the rule of law equal protection of the law freedom of expression and the truth and I don't care whether you're a Republican or a Democrat that's all we are and that's what unites us we've got to start there and then fight about all the other things we want to fight about but if we lose this we what are we we're nothing we're just a collection of ideas in this country and we have to realize we cannot sacrifice those unfortunately that's all the time we have for today director Comey thank you so much for being here if you'd like to watch video clips and other highlights from today's program please visit Washington Post live.com thanks to everyone here in the audience as well as those who watched online we've enjoyed the program we hope you have - thank you I'm gonna turn my water

Channel: Washington Post Live

Views: 82,131

Keywords: james comey, james comey washington post, james comey a higher loyalty, fbi director, comey interview, comey clinton, 2016 election, election 2016, Carol Leonnig, washington post live, washington post interview, trump comey, trump clinton, hillary clinton

Id: K6LcK_bdsHc

Length: 48min 59sec (2939 seconds)

Published: Fri May 11 2018