Former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said on Sunday that he still does not know why President Trump fired him in March, after originally promising to keep him on as the top federal prosecutor in Manhattan, but that watching the testimony of former FBI Director James Comey last week "felt a little bit like deja vu." Bharara told ABC News' George Stephanopoulos that after getting zero calls from former President Barack Obama in seven years, Trump met with him once and called him three times after the election, "ostensibly just to shoot the breeze," and the third time — after the inauguration, and two days before Trump fired him — Bharara said he did not return Trump's call, because it would have been inappropriate.
"I was in discussions with my own folks, and in reporting the phone call to the chief of staff to the attorney general, I said it appeared to be that he was trying to cultivate some kind of relationship," Bharara said. "I'm not the FBI director, but I was the chief federal law enforcement officer in Manhattan with jurisdiction over a lot of things including, you know, business interests and other things in New York."
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Tied Supreme Court blocks church charter schoolspeed read The court upheld the Oklahoma Supreme Court's decision to bar overtly religious public charter schools
-
GOP megabill would limit judicial oversight of Trumpspeed read The domestic policy bill Republicans pushed through the House would protect the Trump administration from the consequences of violating court orders
-
Judge scolds DOJ over Newark mayor arrestspeed read Ras Baraka was arrested during a May 9 surprise visit to a migrant detention facility
-
Trump lectures South Africa president on 'white genocide'speed read Trump has cut off aid to South Africa over his demonstrably false genocide claims
-
Trump twists House GOP arms on megabillspeed read The bill will provide a $350 billion boost to military and anti-immigration spending and 'cuts to Medicaid, food stamps and green energy programs'
-
Trump DOJ said to pay $5M to family of Jan. 6 rioterspeed read The US will pay a hefty sum to the family of Capitol rioter Ashli Babbitt, who was fatally shot on January 6
-
Trump DOJ charging House Democrat in ICE fracasspeed read Rep. LaMonica McIver is being charged with assault over a clash outside an immigration detention facility in Newark
-
Biden diagnosed with aggressive prostate cancerspeed read The diagnosis hits close to home, as the former president 'dedicated much of his later career to cancer research'
