Republican Rep. Trey Gowdy effusively praised former FBI Director James Comey last night on The Story. Gowdy never criticized Donald Trump’s firing of Comey nor did Gowdy take a stand on the memo Comey reportedly prepared alleging that Trump tried to pressure him into dropping an investigation into Mike Flynn, which the White House disputes. But Gowdy could not have left a doubt in anyone’s mind about which side he finds more trustworthy.
From yesterday’s New York Times bombshell:
Mr. Comey wrote the memo detailing his conversation with the president immediately after the meeting, which took place the day after Mr. Flynn resigned, according to two people who read the memo. It was part of a paper trail Mr. Comey created documenting what he perceived as the president’s improper efforts to influence a continuing investigation. An F.B.I. agent’s contemporaneous notes are widely held up in court as credible evidence of conversations.
Mr. Comey shared the existence of the memo with senior F.B.I. officials and close associates. The New York Times has not viewed a copy of the memo, which is unclassified, but one of Mr. Comey’s associates read parts of it to a Times reporter.
“I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go,” Mr. Trump told Mr. Comey, according to the memo. “He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go.
[…]
In a statement, the White House denied the version of events in the memo.
“While the president has repeatedly expressed his view that General Flynn is a decent man who served and protected our country, the president has never asked Mr. Comey or anyone else to end any investigation, including any investigation involving General Flynn,” the statement said. “The president has the utmost respect for our law enforcement agencies, and all investigations. This is not a truthful or accurate portrayal of the conversation between the president and Mr. Comey.”
As I previously reported, Fox News had trouble finding Republicans willing to talk on the air about this latest bombshell. Gowdy didn’t have much to say about it, either, other than that he wants to see the entire memo.
But Gowdy had lots to say about Comey:
Host Martha MacCallum seemed to know about that. She deliberately opened the door for Gowdy to share his thoughts when she asked, about six minutes into the interview, whether Comey’s July 5, 2016 news conference about Hillary Clinton’s emails justified his firing.
GOWDY: No, and I think when history knows the full fact pattern that led Director Comey to have that July news conference – I mean, I think what your viewers know is the meeting on the tarmac between the spouse of a target of an investigation and the attorney general. What your viewers don’t know, Martha, and what Jim Comey, frankly, can’t tell them because it’s classified and I can’t tell them because it’s classified – there were a lot of other reasons that Jim Comey decided to take that decision upon himself.
And I think history – and I’ve had plenty of differences with Jim Comey, I want to be really clear about that, lots of them - but I think history is going to be much kinder to Jim Comey and that July press conference than the Democrats were when he had it. I think he had access to information that because he is a standup guy and he’s not gonna disseminate classified information, although God knows everybody else is, he’s not going to do it even if it casts him in a negative light.
[…]
I think he had access to information and he wanted to safeguard the integrity of the investigation and the integrity of the process and I probably ought to just leave it right there. But no, I’m not talking about pressure. I don’t think they guy feels pressure. I think he wanted the public to have confidence in the investigation and the outcome, even though I disagreed with the outcome, he wanted you to have confidence in the process. He had access to information that your viewers don’t have and they may not ever have because it is classified. But trust me when I tell you this, Martha. I know what it was and I have been a critic of Jim Comey in the past but he made the only decision he could have made with respect to appropriating that decision away from the Department of Justice and making the decision himself. And history will be a hell of a lot kinder to him than the Democrats were at the time.
MACCALLUM: I only take away from that that you’re suggesting that there were more entanglements between the Clintons and, perhaps, the Justice Department than everyone understands.
GOWDY: You’re very perceptive.
Underneath the partisan hints and innuendo which, frankly, made my head spin, Gowdy all but announced that he’d side with Comey over Trump if it comes down to that. It’s quite remarkable coming from a guy like Gowdy who made his name as a Clinton-hating Benghazi fanatic partisan.
Watch the messaging below, from the May 16, 2017 The Story.
After all, he tried desperately for months to "get’ Hillary Clinton on Benghazi, he eventually just gave up for lack of evidence.
It’s obvious to us that the first rats off the ship will suffer the least in the bloody aftermath, but they are still wary of unsettling the peasants before it’s absolutely necessary. Very reminiscent of the situations in 1790’s France and revolutionary Russia right through till the death of Stalin.
Shucks. That sort of thing was obligatory throughout my 50-year long professional career and I still write little notes to myself after meeting with important people like a plumber, a painter, a mechanic or an insurance broker. Helps me keep my facts neat and tidy.