Mueller Has Early Draft of Trump Letter Giving Reasons for Firing Comey

The special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, has obtained a letter that President Donald Trump and a top political aide drafted in the days before President Trump fired the FBI director, James B. Comey, which explains the president’s rationale for why he planned to dismiss the director. The May letter had been met with opposition from Donald F. McGahn II, the White House counsel, who believed that some of its contents were problematic, apparently.

McGahn successfully blocked the president from sending Comey the letter, which President Trump had composed with Stephen Miller, one of the president’s top political advisers. A different letter, written by the deputy attorney general, Rod J. Rosenstein, and focused on Comey’s handling of the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private e-mail server, was ultimately sent to the FBI director on the day he was fired.The contents of the original letter appear to provide the clearest rationale that President Trump had for firing Comey. The Times has not seen a copy of the letter and it is unclear how much of President Trump’s rationale focuses on the Russia investigation.