Trump rips into James Comey over report saying he violated FBI policies in releasing memos

Investigation finds that ex-FBI director ‘failed to live up to his responsibility’ and set a ‘dangerous example’

An investigation into James Comey’s handling of memos related to his meetings with Donald Trump found the former FBI director violated the bureau’s policies, according to the justice department’s report.

Despite finding Mr Comey broke FBI rules when he instructed a friend to share his memos with the media, the report found those memos “did not contain any classified information”.

The president wasted little time criticising the man who became one of his bitterest political enemies after he fired him as FBI chief.

Mr Trump tweeted: "Perhaps never in the history of our Country has someone been more thoroughly disgraced and excoriated than James Comey in the just released Inspector General’s Report. He should be ashamed of himself!"

However, Mr Comey, who has long denied any wrongdoing over his handling of the memos, celebrated the report on Twitter with a swipe at the president, who reportedly wanted to have his former FBI director prosecuted. Mr Trump said he fired Mr Comey in 2017 while considering “this Russia thing”, a move that ultimately sparked an investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election led by special counsel Robert Mueller.

The inspector general “found no evidence that Comey or his attorneys released any of the classified information contained in any of the memos to members of the media”, Mr Comey tweeted, citing a portion of the report.

“I don’t need a public apology from those who defamed me,” he added, “but a quick message with a ‘sorry we lied about you’ would be nice.”

The former FBI director also tweeted: “And to all those who’ve spent two years talking about me ‘going to jail’ or being a ‘liar and a leaker’ – ask yourselves why you still trust people who gave you bad info for so long, including the president.”

While Mr Comey celebrated the findings, the report indicated he “failed to live up to his responsibility” as the head of the federal bureau and set a “dangerous example” in sharing the sensitive information.

The report also found Mr Comey did not notify the bureau about memos he had retained at his home in a private safe.

He said he initially recorded the memos after his several encounters with Mr Trump because he worried about the president lying about those interactions.

Mr Comey stopped short of saying the president obstructed justice in their meetings together during a high-profile testimony on Capitol Hill last year in 2017.

“I don’t think it’s for me to say whether the conversation I had with the president was an effort to obstruct,” he said at the time. “I took it as a very disturbing thing, very concerning, but that’s a conclusion I’m sure the special counsel will work towards to what the intention was there and whether that’s an offence.”

The special counsel’s office then laid out numerous examples of potential obstruction of justice on the part of the president, in a report into Russian interference in the 2016 election.

The Justice Department previously announced its decision not to prosecute Mr Comey.

Mr Comey has become a firebrand on both sides of the political aisle ever since the 2016 election, when he announced the FBI was reviewing new emails pertaining to Hillary Clinton’s time as secretary of state just 11 days before election day. Some analysts have said his public comments helped Mr Trump to victory during the final stretch of the campaign.