Comey Wrote Memo Saying Trump Urged Him to Drop Flynn Investigation: Sources

by ALEX JOHNSON, PETER ALEXANDER and KEN DILANIAN

Fired FBI Director James Comey built a paper trail documenting what he believed to be President Donald Trump's campaign to derail the FBI's investigation of alleged Russian ties to his presidential campaign, a source close to Comey told NBC News on Tuesday.

The documents include a memo in which Comey wrote that Trump asked him to shut down an investigation into former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, the source said. A second source, a former federal law enforcement official, also confirmed the existence of the memo to NBC News.

The unclassified memo was first reported by The New York Times.

Neither NBC News nor The Times has seen the actual memo. But The Times said an associate of Comey's read parts of the memo to a reporter.

The source close to Comey told NBC News that Trump told the then-FBI chief in a White House meeting: "I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go."

The Times reported that the conversation took place Feb. 14. Times reporter Michael Schmidt told MSNBC that Trump "kicked everybody else out of the room" — including Vice President Mike Pence — and made the request one on one. The White House denied that version of events in a statement to NBC News, calling it "not a truthful or accurate portrayal of the conversation between the president and Mr. Comey."

The Guardian

Donald Trump directly asked former FBI director James Comey to drop an investigation into his former national security adviser, Michael Flynn, according to notes kept at the time by Comey and first reported on Tuesday by the New York Times.

“I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go,” Trump told Comey, according to Comey’s record of the meeting, as reported by the Times. “He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go.”

The latest crisis to beset the White House came just 24 hours after the first reports emerged of Trump having shared classified intelligence with Russia during Oval Office talks.

Alone in the Oval Office, Mr. Trump began the discussion by condemning leaks to the news media, saying that Mr. Comey should consider putting reporters in prison for publishing classified information, according to one of Mr. Comey’s associates.