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I would count these as the six biggest highlights of James Comey’s testimony before Congress today:
- Leaked memo. Comey testified that he leaked his own memos in hopes of prompting the appointment of a special prosecutor.
- Jeff Sessions. Comey testified that in addition to Jeff Sessions’ meetings with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak during the 2016 campaign, “We were also aware of facts I can’t discuss in an open setting that would make his continued involvement in a Russia investigation problematic.”
- FBI in chaos. Regarding President Trump’s claim that the FBI was in chaos and agents had lost confidence in Comey, “Those were lies, plain and simple.”
- Loyalty. Comey testified that Trump told him, “I need loyalty. I expect loyalty.” After the hearing, Trump’s lawyer flatly denied this. In essence, he accused Comey of perjury.
- Direction. Regarding Trump’s comment about the Flynn-Russia investigation (“I hope you can let this go”) Comey testified that “I took it as direction.”
- Russia. Comey testified that Trump never once showed any interest in the FBI’s investigation of Russia’s interference with the 2016 election.
More generally, I’d also say that one of the highlights of the hearing was the almost unanimous Republican desire to carry water for Trump and play down the seriousness of what happened. This got almost comical when GOP senators abandoned the subject of the hearing entirely and tried to turn the topic to Hillary Clinton’s email server. I’m only surprised that none of them tried to bring up Benghazi.
