\u00ab\u00a0It’s true. All of it.\u00a0\u00bb \u2014 Han Solo (and James Comey, basically) .<\/b>
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One day before James Comey’s hugely anticipated testimony, a committee released the former FBI director’s statement detailing his chats with President Trump. You can read the whole thing here, and you should.
Comey confirms that Trump requested his loyalty, as previously reported by news outlets, and that Trump asked the then-director to drop an investigation into ex-national security adviser Michael Flynn, as previously reported by news outlets.
In short, Comey said the anonymously sourced stories on Trump and Russia \u2014the sort Trump has decried as #FakeNews on multiple occasions \u2014 are true. Comey testifies at 10 a.m. Eastern time on Thursday, and we have your full viewing guide here. Trump may even comment live on Comey’s testimony via tweets. Or, as Comey might call them, #FakeTweets.
It’s OnPolitics Today, the daily politics roundup from USA TODAY. Subscribe here.
We’re not going to say Trump sounds like a mafia boss in Comey’s seven-page statement, but he doesn’t not sound like a mafia boss, either. \u201cI need loyalty, I expect loyalty, \u00a0\u00bb Trump said, per Comey, at a Jan. 27 dinner between just the two of them. That made it weird, according to Comey.
\u201cI didn\u2019 t move, speak or change my facial expression any way during the awkward silence that followed, \u00a0\u00bb he says.
Comey describes the dinner as \u00ab\u00a0at least in part, an effort to have me ask for my job and create some sort of patronage relationship.\u00a0\u00bb
One bright spot for Trump: The statement confirms Trump’s assertion that Comey told the president multiple times that he wasn’t the subject of the FBI’s Russia inquiry, a bit Trump’s attorney said makes him feel \u00ab\u00a0completely and totally vindicated.\u00a0\u00bb
The memo is extensively detailed \u2014 a grandfather clock in the Oval Office is noted multiple times \u2014 and hints at the meticulous records Comey said he began keeping after his meetings with Trump. In one call with the president, Comey recounts how Trump asked him how they might \u00ab\u00a0lift the cloud\u00a0\u00bb of the ongoing Russia investigation tied to his associates.
Again, just read the whole thing. And tune in tomorrow.
The Trump Organization profited off of a charity golf tournament aimed at benefitting kids cancer research, according to Forbes. The total costs of an annual tournament at the Trump National Golf Club in New York’s Westchester County began at about $50,000 before ballooning to $322,000 by 2015, according to Forbes.
Eric Trump said his foundation used the course \u00ab\u00a0free of charge, \u00a0\u00bb but Forbes found that the family’s conglomerate actually was paid, \u00ab\u00a0part of more than $1.2 million that has no documented recipients past the Trump Organization.\u00a0\u00bb
Also this week: Eric Trump said that Democrats are \u00a0\u00bb not even people .\u00a0\u00bb The comment came in an interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity, as Trump lamented the state of political discourse in the nation.
\u00ab\u00a0Morals have flown out the window, \u00a0\u00bb said Trump, whose father, the president, once bragged about groping women aboard an \u00ab\u00a0Access Hollywood\u00a0\u00bb bus.
The heads of the NSA and national intelligence both told senators Wednesday that they never felt \u00ab\u00a0pressured\u00a0\u00bb to interfere with the Russia investigation. And that’s about all they said.
Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and National Security Agency Director Michael Rogers declined to say much on the matter before the Senate Intelligence Committee, alongside Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.
Coats and Rogers refused to say whether Trump asked them to downplay any Trump-Russia ties. McCabe refused to answer questions about Comey and Trump, and Rosenstein refused to discuss Comey’s firing. Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia later said he left the hearing \u00ab\u00a0with more questions than when I went in.\u00a0\u00bb<\/p>\n

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