Former FBI director James Comey has been invited to testify before the congressional committee on oversight and government reform next week.
The committee — the primary investigative body within the House of Representatives — has set a hearing for May 24 to investigate whether U.S. President Donald Trump interfered in an FBI probe into former national security adviser Michael Flynn.
Committee chair Jason Chaffetz said Wednesday that Comey has been asked to testify at the hearing.
The move comes a day after it was disclosed that Comey had written a memo detailing how Trump had asked him to shut down the investigation into Flynn. The FBI has been looking into Flynn for months as part of a counterintelligence investigation.
Chaffetz has demanded that the FBI turn over Comey’s memos. He said he wants to determine whether the president attempted to influence or impede the FBI’s investigation into Flynn.
Officially noticed a hearing for next Wed at 9:30am ET with former FBI Dir Comey. But I still need to speak with him…evidently has a new #
Abrupt firing
Trump has been under scrutiny from Democrats and political pundits since he abruptly fired Comey last week. At the time, the U.S. president said the dismissal was connected to Comey’s very public handling into the Hillary Clinton email probe.
The White House, meanwhile, has provided differing accounts of the firing. And lawmakers have alleged that the sudden ouster was actually an attempt to stifle the bureau’s investigation into Trump associates’ ties to Russia’s alleged meddling in the 2016 presidential election.
The White House said President Donald Trump will be interviewing four potential candidates to replace Comey, including former Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman.
White House press secretary Sean Spicer said Trump will be meeting later Wednesday with Lieberman, former Oklahoma governor Frank Keating, FBI acting director Andrew McCabe and Richard McFeely, a former top FBI official.
‘You cannot let them get you down’
The president has suggested he hopes to name Comey’s successor before he departs Friday for his first overseas trip as president.
President Donald Trump attends the commencement address at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in New London, Conn., where he struck a defiant tone. (Susan Walsh/Associated Press)
Trump did not speak about Comey at a U.S. Coast Guard Academy commencement in Connecticut on Wednesday, but he struck a defiant tone, telling graduates that no other politician has been treated more unfairly by the media. But, he said, “You cannot let them get you down.”
Meanwhile, House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi is urging Democrats to sign a discharge petition to establish an independent commission to investigate Russian interference in the presidential election and whether associates of the president co-operated with that effort.
Pelosi said the American people “deserve answers and to get to the bottom of the Trump-Russia connection and possible collusion to influence the election.”
A total of 110 lawmakers, including one Republican, had signed the petition as of Wednesday afternoon. At least 216 signatures are needed to bring the measure to the House floor.