'You seem nuts, buddy': Comey reacts to Trump's posting sprees

[00:00:00]We're getting hundreds of people out of  confinement and prisons that shouldn't be there.

[00:00:05]And hundreds and many of them aren't even citizens  of the United States. They're people that have been captured in some form. Ministers, people that  are really innocent people and they're being held captive. And I bring up Jimmy Lee. Now Jimmy Lee,  you know, it caused a lot of bed. I don't know.

[00:00:27]It's like saying to me, uh, if Comey ever went to  jail, would you let him out? That's It might be a hard one for me. Does that make sense? It might  be a hard one to make, you know, cuz he's a dirty cop, but Jimmy lie isn't that way. And on that  note, joining me now is the former FBI director, James Comey, whose new novel, Red Verdict: A Legal  Thriller, is out today. But what did you make of the president first off comparing you there to  this this pro-democracy activist who's been jailed by, you know, a Chinese authoritarian leader?  Yeah, I first of all, I hope my family skips the intro section, but I it confuses me because I  thought Jimmy Lie was a hero. So, it just tells me the guy is not okay, our president. And for some  reason, I'm burrowed into his head. He's tweeting about me when I'm sound asleep or truththing about  me. I don't understand it and can't explain it.

[00:01:23]on the second indictment, what went through your  head when when you got word, I'm assuming from your attorneys, that you had been indicted  a second time? Well, my sense is that this, and I've told my family this, this is going to  continue until this group led by Donald Trump leaves office because for whatever reason, he  is obsessed with retribution in general and especially with me or John Brennan or Adam Schiff.  So, I expect it's going to continue. So, do you think that this could happen potentially again  during Trump's term in office? Oh, sure. I mean, I'm I'm assuming that the first case they brought  went away. Whatever happens with this case, which I'm not going to talk about outside  the courtroom, but whatever happens with it, I would expect they'll try something else.  Do you expect expect this to actually get to to the courtroom to a trial? I don't know. And  as I've said, I I don't want to talk about it outside the courtroom because I have great faith  in the American federal judiciary. And one of the rules of that judiciary is you speak in the  courtroom. in terms of that uh and I understand that you don't want to talk about that given  it will be taking place uh presumably if this all does go to trial. Um the justice department  and what we've heard from White House officials who say when people say is this a vindictive  prosecution here they say well it was a grand jury who indicted him. What would you say to that?  Yeah I don't really know enough to comment because grand jury proceedings are secret. We had some  ability to look into the grand jury proceeding in the first case they brought. A magistrate  judge pointed out misconduct there, but I'm not prepared to comment about anything in the North  Carolina case. And so, as this goes forward, um, you heard the president there when I was asking  his view of your post and if he really thought his life was in danger, he invoked these mob movies  and he said, "If you ever watch these mob movies, you know they always use the term 86 that it means  to to kill them." I mean, you are actually someone who previously prosecuted the mob. What would you  say about that? I'm sure it'll be important for people to actually do the research to see how it's  been used and where it's been used. And I'll leave that to experts. And I don't I'm pretty sure  that fellow talking to you is not an expert of the mob or of this term? Well, he may know a lot  about the mob, but he about this particular term.

[00:03:32]What do you make of of the acting attorney general  Todd Blanch and and how he's running the Justice Department from what you've seen since he's  taken over after Pam Bondi was fired? Well, it appears that Pam Bondi standards were too high.  So, it it's concerning that Pam Bondi struck me as someone who was looking to do the president's  bidding. I hope that Todd Blanch can find maybe in his memory of his time at the Southern  District of New York where I was a federal prosecutor remembrance of the standards and the  norms that have made the Department of Justice special for a long time. Most prominent among them  not being a political force. Do is that what you see playing out right now in the targeting  of the president's enemies and going after John Brennan and calling for the incarceration of  Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama? It doesn't get more vindictive and political than that. I would  hope the Department of Justice would resist that, but they don't have a great track record so far.  What do you make of the Justice Department this time around and this second Trump term compared  to the president's first term when you were still serving obviously in the beginning of that? Yeah,  they're managing to make Bill Barr look principled and good. Good for him. I would like to see him  speak out more to explain why he stood for the things he stood for. It appears now it's operating  as an adjunct of the president's vengeance.

[00:04:49]I mean, they actually have a banner from the  Justice Department hanging up that that Pam Bondi installed of the president's face. I mean, there's  others at the Labor Department and but you know, typically with the Justice Department, there  is that line of independence. You know, when there's a banner of the president's  face hanging from the Justice Department, what do you think would have been the reaction had  any other president done that? They didn't get the banner big enough to block the chiseling in the  wall outside the Justice Department that says, "Where law ends, tyranny begins." The  Department of Justice stands for justice, which we always depict with a blindfold in this  country because it has to be that way. To be just, the idea that you're hanging anyone's face on  the outside of the Department of Justice, no less this person, is an obscenity. You just mentioned  John Brennan, Cassidy Hutchinson. I mean, those are people that and you saw the president's repost  there mentioning Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.

[00:05:44]I mean, do you actually believe that that those  people should be preparing to also be indicted and be in your shoes? Well, I'm sure that they are.  I hope they're speaking to good lawyers, which is part of the punishment, right? The process is  the punishment with these characters, but I hope they're consulting with good lawyers because the  president is telling the Department of Justice, which is an adjunct of his vengeance campaign,  to go after these people. So, if I'm them, I would steal myself for things to happen. I mean,  I imagine you prepared for another indictment after the first one is thrown out. Sure. And I'm  preparing for three and four. I mean, it's not going to stop given who is currently president  of the United States and the way he has shaped or really torn apart the Justice Department. It's  not going to stop until they're gone from office.

[00:06:27]You think you could be indicted a third time or  a fourth time or Yeah. I just don't know. I mean, I don't know what it might be. I hear about crazy  sort of red string crazy wall conspiracy theories in Florida. I don't know what they're cooking  up, but I would expect there will be more efforts to get the president's enemies because he's  obsessed with it. And that's really really sad.

[00:06:45]There was a a former top justice department  official who's will remain anonymous who messaged me after you got indicted the second time and this  is not someone who really is is does exaggerate or embellishes and said this might be the worst case  the DOJ has filed in my lifetime. I wonder what you think of when you hear that you know what  you've heard personally from people since the second indictment happened. Well, there's been a  lot of support from lawyers, especially across the spectrum, but I it's not, again, I don't want to  react to that because I want to be disciplined. I don't care what government officials do. I am  going to abide the court rules and not speak about it outside the courtroom. Can you say if you  regret posting the picture, just given everything that's happened? Yeah, I'd love to, but I I'm not  going to answer that. You might ask, do I regret becoming FBI director? Do I regret becoming Donald  Trump's obsession in the middle of the night? No.

[00:07:41]I loved that work. It was really important. I love  the people of the FBI. I grieve what's happened to them, but so I have no regrets there. But I'm  not going to talk about the shells right now.

[00:07:49]You know, he posted a lot overnight, as I just  mentioned, you know, bringing up things about Obama. That's one of the things I assume you're  mentioning when you say you don't know what the possible future indictments could could be. Um,  a lot of debunked conspiracy theories about the election, Hillary Clinton, the 2020 election. You  used to brief him. I mean, in 2016 in the run-up to the election and in 2017, do you think he's the  same person as he was when you used to sit in the Oval Office with him? He doesn't seem okay to me.  And I know that sounds like a political shot. It seems like there's something wrong with the man.  There was always something wrong with the man and that he lacks a moral center, but this seems off.  This middle of the night obsessive truth after not an actual truth, but a retroing retruthing on  his platform seems crazy to me. So, you seem to think it's different. Yeah, he seems different in  a bad way. Not different and you redid your hair.

[00:08:41]I mean, different in that you seem nuts, buddy.  And why do you what do you attribute that to? I don't know. Yeah, I don't know. You mentioned just  the being FBI director, not regretting serving.

[00:08:53]And in that time, the former president, Barack  Obama, actually, you know, we don't hear from him that often on stuff like this. He actually  weighed in last week on the Justice Department and the institution as a whole last week and said  this. The the idea is that the attorney general is the people's lawyer. It's not the president's  concigary. There there's a bunch of stuff that you know we we can overcome. We can't overcome the  politization of the criminal justice system. The the the awesome power of the state. You you can't  have a situation in which uh whoever is in charge of the government starts using that to go after  their political enemies. What do you hear in that answer? A statement of principle that I thought  everyone agreed to. Again, we depict Lady Justice with a blindfold because we all get that our  country is seriously diminished if we start making decisions about the awesome power of the justice  system based on who you like, what you look like, how much money you have for very very principled  and practical reasons. The whole system doesn't work. And and I would expect Republicans, I  know there's a lot trapped in the cult of MAGA, to step back and say, "Whoa, what if that shoe  was on the other foot? How would that be?"

[00:10:12]It would be awful no matter who's being  targeted. What would you if they someone might hear that? I can hear a Trump attorney now  saying, "Well, they did go after him, you know, when he was out of office." And they did indict  him. What would you say to that defense? Take a step back and look at the cases. Look at the work  they did. And remember this, the Biden Justice Department indicted the president's son. Can you  imagine that happening today? Honestly, while you're shaving MAGA supporter in the mirror, look  in the mirror and say, "Could that happen today?"