his conditioning, but he is not sure how much 2016 predictions affected him. i thought if i hide this, she will be he says that he is ego driven and unethical. the white house counter punch, attack comey s credibility. he knew exactly what he was doing. he thought hillary clinton would win and this would give him some cover. but comey whose tenure term was not up until 2023, he says the election outcome would not affect his job, which is why he
his lifetime been a dedicated and respected and heroic public servant. he after college volunteered to serve as a marine in vietnam where he was wounded in combat. he attended law school and devoted most of his career as a federal prosecutor with the exception of brief stints in private practice he served as united states attorney in two districts in massachusetts and northern california and served in many other departments as he lost his position as the head of the criminal division when president clinton was elected in 1992. he went into private practice and then went back at an entry level position as a homicide prosecution in the district of columbia in 1990s. he rose through the ranks and was confirmed i believe unanimously as f.b.i. director, protected this nation after 9/11 and then when his tenure term expired he was so well respected that his term was
my instincts told me that the one-on-one setting and the pretense that this was our first discussion about my position meant the dinner was at least in part an effort to have me ask for my job and create some sort of patronage relationship. that concerned me greatly, given the fbi s traditionally independent status in the executive branch. i relied that i love my work and intended to stay and serve out my tenure term as director. and then, because the setup made me uneasy, i added that i was not, quote, reliable in the way politicians use that word but he could always count on me to tell the truth. i added that i was not on anybody s side politically and could not be counted on in the traditional political sense, a stance that i was in the best interest of the president. a few moments later, the president said, and i m quoting james comey, i need loyalty. i expect loyalty. i didn t move, speak or change
it s a matter of post-kennedy administration, post-johnson administration tradition. i suspect historians will go back and find very often that president that doesn t justify it. the law changed. that s why they created a tenure term for the fbi director. if you wanted to defend this on the grounds the behavior of kennedy-j. edgar hoover was appropriate, you cannot behave the way john f. kennedy and bobby kennedy behaved in 1962. it is not whether it was appropriate or justified. my point is whether it was illegal. the law doesn t change the laws have changed. there have been new laws since 1962. criminal laws don t change. there are new criminal laws since 1962. the government practices in terms of political the law that existed prior to the kennedy administration. just because we have new sensitivities, which we should, and tell us what happened here is wrong doesn t mean you can go
jurortive term, but the political forces in the executive branch, and that s why the director is given a tenure term, so it is guaranteed that you ll span presidential administrations to make sure that you re leading in a way that s not influenced by the political winds. richard painter, to you, with your hat on as a former white house ethics lawyer. is there, given comey s comments about why fbi directors have ten-year terms and why they have to be beyond politics or even the appearance thereof, do you believe that anyone with a political background can be tapped and be trusted by this president at this point in time? oh, i think they can. i ve worked in republican politics for about 30 years. i know some of these people. they re very good people. i think they could do an excellent job as director of the fbi, but it s going to be critical that there will be an independent prosecutor for the trump/russia connection investigation. that should not be handled by the fbi director. and