Former FBI director James Comey described Donald Trump as a “retribution president” in the Express last summer. “He will surely be vengeful and has committed to being the ‘retribution’ president,” Comey told me. “He rarely fulfils policy or financial promises, but he always follows through on threats because he fears looking weak.”
Those words seem eerily prescient today after Comey, 64, once America’s most senior lawman as head of the powerful FBI, was sensationally charged by a federal grand jury in Virginia this week with two offences related to testimony he gave to Congress. Comey, who has declared himself innocent and says he had “great confidence in the federal judicial system”, is accused of lying to a Senate committee in 2020 about whether he authorised a leak of classified information to the media.
But the case deepens concerns the Justice Department is being weaponised in pursuit of investigations and prosecutions of public figures the President regards as political enemies.
Career lawman Comey took down notorious mafioso John Gotti as US Attorney of New York in 1992. In 2012, having been a senior Justice Department official in Republican President George W. Bush’s administration, he was appointed by Barack Obama with bi-partisan support to a 10-year term as the seventh director of the FBI. But he was fired just four years into his term by Trump in May 2017 after refusing to pledge his fealty to the President.
A softly-spoken and thoughtful man, Comey has subsequently come under frequent fire from Trump. Speaking in June last year ahead of the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival 2024, the former FBI director turned acclaimed crime writer, whose latest book is FDR Drive, was still optimistic the Democrats would win last November’s election but remained aware of the dangers.
Asked if a re-elected Trump might try to damage him, he replied: “I have no doubt he would if he could. I seem to be a relationship he can’t get over. But I’m over it and I will be fine. I worry more about the career civil servants who are less able to defend themselves.”
Watching Trump’s then criminal trials play out, he told me, had been “uplifting, depressing, and frustrating”.
“Uplifting, because I think one of the parts of America that has passed its stress test is the legal system,” he explained. “Seeing a former president held accountable is inspiring and a great lesson for our country about the vital importance of the rule of law. Depressing, because our former president and current presidential candidate is a criminal – literally. Frustrating, because significant cases against Trump may not be resolved quickly.”
Despite the trials, Trump, 79, was sensationally reelected and became 47th President of the United States in January. Since then, as predicted by Comey, he has been on a vendetta against his enemies. And the ex-lawman is now in the uncomfortable position of finding out just how that feels. This week he said on Instagram: “Somebody that I love dearly recently said that fear is the tool of a tyrant and she’s right but I’m not afraid and I hope you’re not either.
“My family and I have known for years that there are costs to standing up to Donald Trump. But we couldn’t imagine ourselves living any other way. We will not live on our knees and you shouldn’t either.”