Cummings wants ‘emergency hearings’ over Comey firing
“Congress needs to have immediate emergency hearings to obtain testimony directly from Attorney General [Jeff] Sessions, the deputy attorney general and FBI Director Comey,” Cummings said in a statement.
“The White House was already covering up for [former national security adviser] Michael Flynn by refusing to provide a single document to Congress, and now the President fired the one independent person who was doing the most to investigate President Trump and his [2016] campaign over allegations of coordination with Russia.”
Cummings added that Sessions’s involvement in Comey’s ouster is “mindboggling,” noting that Sessions stated that he would recuse himself from investigations into any ties between Trump and Russia.
“There is now a crisis of confidence at the Justice Department, and President Trump is not being held accountable because House Republicans refuse to work with us to do our job,” the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee added.
The White House announced Tuesday afternoon that Trump had fired Comey following recommendations from Sessions and his deputy, Rod Rosenstein, over his handling of the investigation into Hillary Clinton's handling of classified emails.
Cummings can go pound sand :shrug: Comey's Employment is an executive decision
Democrats: Comey firing ‘Nixonian’
WASHINGTON
Furious Democrats branded the firing of FBI Director James Comey as “Nixonian,” warning the probe into the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia had been dangerously compromised.
They warned of a possible constitutional crisis, painting a troubling picture of a dictatorial president suddenly dismissing the key investigator into allegations that have raised serious questions about his campaign’s links to Russia.
“This is Nixonian,” said the usually measured Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., recalling President Richard Nixon’s “Saturday Night Massacre” in 1973. Nixon forced the firing of the special prosecutor investigating the Watergate campaign scandal.
Sen. Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., a Senate Intelligence Committee member, made a more direct connection. “President Trump’s dismissal of FBI Director Comey smacks of President Nixon's Saturday Night Massacre. If this is an effort to stop the investigations into Russian collusion with the Trump campaign, it won’t succeed,” he said.
Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., saying “the reasoning and timing behind this firing is absolutely preposterous and unbelievable,” added that “It smacks of a Nixon-esque cover up of President Trump’s Kremlin ties.”
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said he told Trump in a phone call Tuesday afternoon that he was “making a big mistake” in firing Comey. The New York Democrat questioned why Comey was fired now, noting that the FBI, Senate and House are investigating whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia.
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