Of Course Trump Is Using the Inspector General’s Report to Attack the Russia Probe

The president previews his new line of argument against Mueller’s investigation.

Yang Chenglin/ZUMA

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

As widely expected, President Donald Trump seized upon a newly released report by the Justice Department’s inspector general to attack James Comey and commend his own decision to fire the former FBI director in May 2017. “Good instincts,” Trump wrote of himself Friday morning.

The self-admiration comes despite Trump having said in a television interview shortly after the explosive firing that he got rid of Comey because of “this Russia thing.” Trump reportedly followed up on the startling admission by telling Russian officials the dismissal had relieved pressure on the White House.

The president on Friday also blasted two FBI agents cited in Thursday’s much-anticipated report, Lisa Page and Peter Strzok. The inspector general criticized anti-Trump text messages they exchanged, concluding they had “cast a cloud” over the bureau. But Trump failed to mention that the report did not find any evidence of political bias in the actions of Comey or the two FBI agents. Trump instead retweeted a string of Fox & Friends clips featuring Jason Chaffetz, in which the former Republican congressman from Utah claimed the report undermined special counsel Robert Mueller’s entire investigation.

“Anything Mueller is doing with his investigation is tainted by the fact that you had these people who had a political objective to take down Donald Trump,” Chaffetz claimed.

The president’s tweets, which are his first public response to Thursday’s report, preview what is expected to be the newest line of attack against the ongoing Russia probes. 

WE'LL BE BLUNT:

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't find elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

payment methods

WE'LL BE BLUNT

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't find elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate