WASHINGTON, D.C. — President Donald Trump’s personal attorney Marc Kasowitz accused former FBI Director James Comey, in response to Comey’s Thursday testimony on Capitol Hill, of retaliating against Trump by leaking privileged communications with the President to the press.
Kasowitz made a statement in response to Comey’s testimony in the congressional hearing, a portion of which reads:
…it is overwhelmingly clear that there have been and continue to be those in government who are actively attempting to undermine this administration with selective and illegal leaks of classified information and privileged communications. Mr. Comey has now admitted that he is one of these leakers.
Today, Mr. Comey admitted that he unilaterally and surreptitiously made unauthorized disclosures to the press of privileged communications with the President. The leaks of this privileged information began no later than March 2017 when friends of Mr. Comey have stated that he disclosed to them the conversations that he had with the President during their January 27, 2017 dinner and February 14, 2017 White House meeting. Today, Mr. Comey admitted that he leaked to friends of his, purported memos of those privileged conversations, one of which he testified, was classified. Mr. Comey also testified that immediately after he was terminated he authorized his friends to leak the contents of those memos to the press in order to, in Mr. Comey’s words, “prompt the appointment of a special counsel.” Although Mr. Comey testified that he only leaked the memos in response to a tweet, the public record reveals that the New York Times was quoting from those memos the day before the referenced tweet, which belies Mr. Comey’s excuse for this unauthorized disclosure of privileged information and appears to be entirely retaliatory. We will leave it to the appropriate authorities to determine whether these leaks should be investigated along with all the others that are being investigated.
In some, it is now established that the President was not being investigated for colluding with or attempting to obstruct any investigation.
As the committee pointed out today, these important facts for the country to know are virtually the only facts that have not been leaked during the course of these events.
As he said yesterday, the President feels completely vindicated and is eager to continue moving forward with his agenda, with the business of this country and with this public cloud removed. Thank you.
Comey testified before congress on Thursday, admitting that he leaked information to friends and gave them permission to leak that information to the press.
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