KRAUTHAMMER: Comey's firing is 'inexplicable' and 'implausible'
Fox News contributor Charles Krauthammer slammed President Donald Trump's decision to fire FBI Director James Comey on Tuesday, calling it "inexplicable" and saying the stated rationale behind the decision was "implausible."
"Here's what so odd about it. This is about, according to the deputy attorney general, something that occurred on July the 5th," Krauthammer said, referring to the July 2016 press conference during which Comey said the FBI would not recommend charges against former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for her use of a private email server.
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein said in his letter recommending Comey's dismissal that the determinant of Comey's removal was his "handling of the conclusion of the investigation of Secretary Clinton's emails."
Krauthammer called the reasoning "implausible," adding that "if that was so offensive to the Trump administration, which you would have done during the transition is you would have spoken to Comey and said, 'We're going to let you go.'"
He continued: "That is when a president could very easily make a decision to have a change that's not unprecedented ... To fire him summarily in the middle of May for something that happened in July is inexplicable."
Comey apparently found out he had been fired when he was speaking to FBI officials in Los Angeles. While he was speaking to department employees, televisions around him began breaking the news. He received Trump's termination letter shortly after.
Krauthammer said it was clear Comey's firing had been in the works for days, echoing reports from the New York Times that the White House and the Department of Justice had been working on firing Comey for the last few days and Attorney General Jeff Sessions was charged with the task of coming up with a reason.
Krauthammer asked why Comey was fired "this way."
"Why was it done with malice? I mean, there would have been so many ways of having Comey sort of, step aside, say he was in an untenable position," he said.
In the wake of Comey's firing, his deputy, Andrew McCabe, is the acting FBI director.