Former Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson warned James Comey not to brief President Trump on the Russia dossier because he worried Trump would see it as a threat.
Johnson said on CBS’ “Face The Nation” he told Comey Trump might not take the briefing as an information-only meeting, instead seeing a deeper threat behind the briefing.
“I was concerned when I heard the plan for the director of the FBI to one-on-one brief Mr. Trump about this dossier. Jim and I had discussed over time the Hoover era history of the FBI,” he said. “My only grandfather, and Jim knows this, who was a sociologist, has an FBI file of several hundred pages, so Jim and I talked about the history of the FBI, and he literally finished my sentence.
“I said there’s a fine distinction between telling somebody just so you know and telling somebody just so you know, and don’t mess with us. And I was concerned that the president-elect was going to hear the latter, and not the former message. And Jim understood that. And I think he did his best.”
Comey briefed Trump on unconfirmed information in the dossier that was being spread in the media. The meeting, in January 2017, took place at Trump Tower just a few weeks before news outlets printed information from the dossier.
Johnson said he wanted Comey to know what he would be dealing with when talking to Trump.
“That’s a good question, I was not in the FBI director’s position,” Johnson said when asked if he would have not given the briefing if he was in Comey’s shoes.
“But I was concerned about what he was about to do, and felt as a friend, that I should talk to him because I had met Mr. Trump during the campaign and the transition.”
