Sean Spicer explains Trump lied about tapes to make Comey think he'd 'better tell the truth'

(Image credit: NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/Getty Images)

published 23 June 2017

White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer made an on-camera appearance Friday on Fox News to discuss President Trump's recent admission that he has no tapes of his conversations with former FBI Director James Comey. Spicer denied Democrats' claims that Trump had falsely indicated on Twitter that he'd recorded his conversations with Comey to "intimidate" the FBI director.

Spicer said that actually, by making these claims, Trump was pursuing his truth-finding mission — not, say, lying to coerce a witness. "I think the president made it very clear that he wanted the truth to come out," Spicer said. "He wanted everyone to be honest about this and he wanted to get to the bottom of it. I think he succeeded in doing that."

Spicer argued that by referencing the non-existent tapes, Trump "made Comey in particular think to himself, 'I better be honest. I better tell the truth.'" The White House press secretary seemingly suggested that if weren't for Trump's baseless threat of tapes, Comey might not have been truthful about the fact that Trump was not personally under investigation in connection to the ongoing probe into Russian election meddling.