Giuliani claims Comey tried to ‘frame’ Trump after IG report

President Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani accused former FBI Director James Comey of trying to “frame” the president after the publication of an inspector general report found that Comey’s handling of memos was in violation of FBI policies.

“In a case involving the President of the United States, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that what Comey was trying to do was to frame Trump,” Giuliani said on John Catsimatidis’s radio show that aired Sunday. “Law enforcement officers that frame people … they’re horrid.”

He later said that Comey “orchestrated” the investigation by former special counsel Robert Mueller. 

“He orchestrated the whole thing,” Giuliani said of Comey. “If you look back on it now, there was never any need for Mueller.” {mosads}

The Justice Department inspector general report said leaked memos that Comey gave to his friend Daniel Richman, a Columbia University law professor, were meant to cause the appointment of a special counsel, according to Comey. 

Comey told the inspector general that he had to leak the memo because it concerned a matter of “incredible importance to the Nation, as a whole,” according to the report.

Trump and his allies have seized on the inspector general’s findings. 

The president on Saturday called the former FBI director a “CROOKED COP!” on Twitter.

Comey, meanwhile, noted that the report “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,” although it did find that he leaked information to his friend, who later gave it to The New York Times. 

Comey’s firing prompted the appointment of Mueller, who investigated whether the Trump campaign conspired with Russia. His report on the probe, released earlier this year, laid out 10 episodes in which Trump may have obstructed justice but did not find evidence of illegal coordination with Russia.