Comey Memos

Last year Former FBI director James Comey revealed that he had written memos detailing remembered conversations with President Trump, while some lawmakers were able to view them last summer, no copies had been provided to Congress.

On Thursday the DOJ had agreed to turn over the memos to three House Committees, forty minutes after the memos were sent, the AP published the redacted memos.

Document Cloud has the PDF available of the four redacted and three unclassified memos.

The memos include documentation of seven conversations that Comey had with President Trump from January 7, 2017, through April 11, 2017.

Some Memo Highlights:

Trump Tower Meeting January 6th, 2017  (pg 1-2)

This was Comey and then President Elect Trump’s first meeting where Comey discussed the alleged Russian tapes of President Elect Trump and prostitutes.

“there were no prostitutes, there were never prostitutes.”

Dinner at the White House January 27th, 2017 (pg 3-6)

Comey describes the one hour and twenty minute dinner as “chaotic” and filled with little silence, with President Trump doing most of the talking. They talked about many varying topics, including speaking about the “golden showers thing”, President Trump calling it “fake news.” President Trump continued pointing out that he had spoken to people that reminded him he had not stayed the night in Russia during the Miss Universe trip. He mused about asking Comey to investigate the “tape”. Comey explained how hard it is to disprove a lie.

It was at this meeting that President Trump, according to Comey’s words, expressed his need for loyalty. Comey replied that he would always be honest with the President to which Trump asked for “honest loyalty.”

Comey then wrote that President Trump spoke of his reservations on Mike Flynn, and questioned Flynn’s “judgement.” Comey wrote that he did not mention any FBI involvement or interest in Flynn.

Comey meets with Reince Priebus and speaks with President Trump in the Oval Office, February 8th, 2017 (pg 7-9)

Comey and former COS Reince Priebus met, brushed against the immigration order, before moving on once again to the President’s interest in having the FBI potentially investigate the “golden shower thing,”. Comey wrote that he once again repeated his concern about not wanting to create a narrative where the FBI was investigating the President. They discussed leaks, (redacted), Priebus asked if there was an FISA on Flynn, Comey’s answer, (redacted). They moved on to talking about the email investigation.

It was at this point that Priebus led Comey into the Oval Office, where Comey met Sean Spicer. President Trump brought the email investigation, asked if McCabe had a problem with him, and again President Trump brought up the “golden shower thing,” and stated it bothered him if his wife had any doubt about it, and that he hadn’t stayed the night in Russia. He said “the hooker thing is nonsense,” but mentioned that Putin told him, “we have some of the most beautiful hookers in the World,”. He didn’t mention when Putin had said that.

Homeland threat briefing for President Trump and a conversation about Flynn in the Oval Office February 14th, 2017 (10-11)

After the Oval Office Homeland Security session, President Trump cleared the room of everyone but Comey. Speaking of Flynn the President said that although He “hadn’t done anything wrong” by calling Russia, he had mislead the Vice President “a good guy”, so he had no choice to fire Flynn and it didn’t really matter as he had a great guy to replace him.

President Trump then brought up the leaks of his phone calls with the leaders of both Mexico and Australia, Comey writes that he did try and interject several times to agree with him that the leak were terrible, but he was unsuccessful. While Comey explained some details about finding the leakers, President Trump mentioned Judith Miller and how jailing reporters to find out what they knew worked. Comey states that while he was a fan of pursuing the leaks aggressively that going after reporters was tricky, for legal reasons, and because the DOJ tends to approach it conservatively. President Trump then told Comey to talk with Attorney General Sessions about being more aggressive on the matter, to which comey agreed.

The conversation went back to Flynn. President Trump said, “I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go. He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go.”

Email From Comey to his COS James Rybicki March 1,2017 (pg 12)

Comey describes a phone between he and President Trump as just a ‘check in’ call to see how everything was going.

Phone Call Comey and President Trump (pg 13-14)

Comey wrote that President Trump blamed the Russia Investigation for the reason the healthcare vote was lost, stating, “was trying to run the country and the cloud of this Russia business was making that difficult,” President Trump once again reiterated he had nothing to do with Russia.

Comey continues stating that President Trump asked, “what can you do to lift that cloud,” Comey replied explaining that “we were running it down as quickly as possible.” It was then that Comey reminded President Trump that he wasn’t under investigation and had told the Congressional leaders the same thing. President Trump said it would be great if he could get that out and asked Comey several times to find a way to do it.

Phone Call President Trump April 10th, 2017 (pg 15)

Comey wrote that the purpose of this phone call was to ask if the word had gotten out that President Trump was not under investigation. Comey explained that he had passed on the request to the acting Attorney General but hadn’t heard back. President Trump said it was so important to lift the cloud of the Russia investigation so he can do work for the country.