James Comey was fired after foiling Donald Trump’s plot with the Russians to get Julian Assange off the hook
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange conspired with the Russian government and the Donald Trump campaign to strategically release real and doctored emails during the election that had been stolen from the Democratic National Committee, a criminal plot that’s going to land dozens is not hundreds of people in prison. Now we’re learning that Trump and the Russians tried last year to get Assange off the hook – and it was foiled by then-FBI director James Comey.
The story went like this: a lawyer who worked for Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska was sent to help Julian Assange try to negotiate a limited immunity deal which would have freed him from the embassy basement he’s been holed up in for several years. But when Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Mark Warner learned of the scheme, he alerted Comey, who stepped in and put a stop to it, according to The Hill. This adds an entirely new context to Comey’s firing, which came not long after.
Now we know that when Donald Trump fired James Comey from the FBI, he wasn’t merely doing so with the knowledge that Comey was investigating the Trump-Russia scandal. Trump was also ridding himself of someone who had foiled his scheme to help Assange, a plan which was initiated by the Russians. For reference, Deripaska was the Russian oligarch who had Trump’s campaign chairman Paul Manafort on his payroll for several years, and who communicated with Manafort during the election.
In other words, James Comey’s firing was almost certainly influenced or directed by the Russians. This may help explain why Donald Trump invited the Russian Ambassador and Russian Foreign Minister into the Oval Office immediately after Comey was fired, and why the Russians were so visibly giddy about it. Trump’s firing of Comey already represented felony obstruction of justice. This adds a whole new level of criminality to the firing, more along the lines of conspiracy against the United States or worse.
