U.S. Department of Justice
Attorney Work Product // May Contain Material Protected Under Fed. R. Crim. P. 6(e)
to intervene with Comey.[1] McGahn recalled Boente telling him in calls that day that he did not think it was sustainable for Comey to stay on as FBI director for the next four years, which McGahn said he conveyed to the President.[2] Boente did not recall discussing with McGahn or anyone else the idea that Comey should not continue as FBI director.[3]
- 3. The President Asks Intelligence Community Leaders to Make Public Statements that he had No Connection to Russia
In the weeks following Comey's March 20, 2017 testimony, the President repeatedly asked intelligence community officials to push back publicly on any suggestion that the President had a connection to the Russian election-interference effort.
On March 22, 2017, the President asked Director of National Intelligence Daniel Coats and CIA Director Michael Pompeo to stay behind in the Oval Office after a Presidential Daily Briefing.[4] According to Coats, the President asked them whether they could say publicly that no link existed between him and Russia.[5] Coats responded that the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) has nothing to do with investigations and it was not his role to make a public statement on the Russia investigation.[6] Pompeo had no recollection of being asked to stay behind after the March 22 briefing, but he recalled that the President regularly urged officials to get the word out that he had not done anything wrong related to Russia.[7]
Coats told this Office that the President never asked him to speak to Comey about the FBI investigation.[8] Some ODNI staffers, however, had a different recollection of how Coats described the meeting immediately after it occurred. According to senior ODNI official Michael Dempsey, Coats said after the meeting that the President had brought up the Russia investigation and asked him to contact Comey to see if there was a way to get past the investigation, get it over with, end it, or words to that effect.[9] Dempsey said that Coats described the President's comments as falling "somewhere between musing about hating the investigation" and wanting Coats to "do something to stop it."[10] Dempsey said Coats made it clear that he would not get involved with an ongoing FBI investigation.[11] Edward Gistaro, another ODNI official, recalled
- ↑ 31 SC_AD_00210 (Donaldson 3/21/17 Notes); McGahn 12/12/17 302, at 7; Donaldson 11/6/17 302, at 19.
- ↑ McGahn 12/12/17 302, at 7; Burnham 11/03/17 302, at 11.
- ↑ Boente 1/31/18 302, at 3.
- ↑ Coats 6/14/17 302, at 3; Culver 6/14/17 302, at 2.
- ↑ Coats 6/14/17 302, at 3.
- ↑ Coats 6/14/17 302, at 3.
- ↑ Pompeo 6/28/17 302, at 1-3.
- ↑ Coats 6/14/17 302, at 3.
- ↑ Dempsey 6/14/17 302, at 2.
- ↑ Dempsey 6/14/17 302, at 2-3.
- ↑ Dempsey 6/14/17 302, at 3.
55
