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Andrew McCabe, a Target of Trump’s F.B.I. Scorn, Is Fired Over Candor Questions
By MATT APUZZO and ADAM GOLDMAN MARCH 16, 2018
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The dismissal of Andrew G. McCabe, the former F.B.I. deputy director, was carried out against a highly politicized backdrop. Credit Al Drago/The New York Times
WASHINGTON — Andrew G. McCabe, the former F.B.I. deputy director and a frequent target of President Trump’s scorn, was fired Friday after the Attorney General Jeff Sessions rejected an appeal that would have let him retire this weekend.
Mr. McCabe promptly declared that his firing, and Mr. Trump’s persistent needling, were intended to undermine the special counsel’s investigation in which he is a potential witness.
Mr. McCabe is accused in a yet-to-be-released internal report of failing to be forthcoming about a conversation he authorized between F.B.I. officials and a journalist.
In a statement released late Friday, Mr. Sessions said that Mr. McCabe had shown a lack of candor under oath on multiple occasions.
“The F.B.I. expects every employee to adhere to the highest standards of honesty, integrity and accountability,” he said. “I have terminated the employment of Andrew McCabe effective immediately.”
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In an interview, Mr. McCabe was blunt. “The idea that I was dishonest is just wrong,” he said, adding, “This is part of an effort to discredit me as a witness.”
F.B.I. disciplinary officials recommended his dismissal. Mr. McCabe, who stepped down in January and took a leave of absence, denied the accusation and appealed this week to senior career officials in the Justice Department.
Lack of candor is a fireable offense at the F.B.I., but Mr. McCabe’s last-minute dismissal was carried out against a highly politicized backdrop.
Mr. McCabe was among the first at the F.B.I. to scrutinize possible Trump campaign ties to Russia. And he is a potential witness to the question of whether Mr. Trump tried to obstruct justice. Mr. Trump has taunted Mr. McCabe both publicly and privately, and Republican allies have cast him as the center of a “deep state” effort to undermine the Trump presidency.
As a witness, Mr. McCabe would be in a position to corroborate the testimony of the former F.B.I. director, James B. Comey, who kept contemporaneous notes on his conversations with Mr. Trump. Mr. Comey said Mr. Trump prodded him to publicly exonerate the president on the question of Russian collusion and encouraged him to shut down an investigation into his national security adviser.
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Turnover at a Constant Clip: The Trump Administration’s Major Departures
Since President Trump’s inauguration, staffers of the White House and federal agencies have left in firings and resignations, one after the other.
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In a statement released by his lawyers, Mr. McCabe said his firing was part of Mr. Trump’s “ongoing war on the F.B.I.” and Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel. He said he answered questions truthfully in the internal investigation and contacted investigators to correct the record when he believed they misunderstood him.
“I am being singled out and treated this way because of the role I played, the actions I took and the events I witnessed in the aftermath of the firing of James Comey,” he said.
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Mr. McCabe, a 21-year F.B.I. veteran, was eligible for a government pension if he retired on Sunday. The firing jeopardizes that benefit, though it was not immediately clear how much he might lose.
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“It’s incredibly unfair to my reputation after a 21-year career,” Mr. McCabe said. He said the president’s public attacks were aimed at several targets. “The real damage is being done to the F.B.I., law enforcement and the special counsel,” he said.
Mr. McCabe was the F.B.I.’s second in command during one of the most tumultuous periods in the bureau’s history. He oversaw investigations into both the Trump campaign and Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server — and he dealt with the fallout from both. He became the acting F.B.I. director after the sudden firing of his boss, Mr. Comey, and he publicly contradicted the White House on national television over whether Mr. Comey had lost the support of rank-and-file F.B.I. agents.
Since then, Mr. Trump has repeatedly singled him out for public attack, suggesting that he helped protect Mrs. Clinton from prosecution during the 2016 presidential campaign. As evidence, he pointed to the fact that Mr. McCabe’s wife, Jill, ran as a Democrat for a State Senate seat in Virginia and received hundreds of thousands of dollars from a political committee run by Terry McAuliffe, a longtime ally of the Clintons.
As recently as Thursday, even as the White House said it left Mr. McCabe’s fate in Mr. Sessions’s hands, officials there left little doubt where the president stood. “It is well documented that he has had some very troubling behavior and by most accounts a bad actor,” said the White House press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
Mrs. McCabe lost her race and Mr. McCabe was later promoted to deputy director, where he oversaw the investigation into Mrs. Clinton. No charges were filed in that case, and Mr. Trump has pointed to the donations to Mrs. McCabe’s campaign as evidence of F.B.I. bias.
The president is not involved in the firing decisions of career employees like Mr. McCabe. His firing had been recommended by veteran disciplinary officials. But Mr. Trump’s statements loom large over the decision, which is why previous presidents have typically refrained from wading into law enforcement and personnel matters.
The inspector general’s report faults Mr. McCabe for his lack of candor in interviews with internal investigators. The report has not been released, but people briefed on it say the allegations revolve around disclosures to The Wall Street Journal, which reported in October 2016 a dispute between the F.B.I. and the Justice Department over how to proceed in an investigation into the Clinton family’s foundation.
Mr. McCabe, working through the F.B.I. press office, authorized a spokesman and a bureau lawyer to speak with The Journal in order to rebut allegations that Mr. McCabe had slowed down the Clinton Foundation investigation. To the contrary, the article ultimately noted, Mr. McCabe had insisted that his agents had the authority to investigate the foundation, even if the Justice Department refused to authorize grand jury subpoenas.
Mr. McCabe joined the F.B.I. after law school and rose quickly through the ranks. Mr. Comey groomed him for senior leadership from a young age, rankling some agents who saw him as too academic and not enough of a traditional crime-fighter. But senior F.B.I. officials and his counterparts in other agencies praised his intellect and ability to manage complicated worldwide national security issues.
Katie Benner contributed reporting from Austin, Tex.
A version of this article appears in print on March 17, 2018, on Page A15 of the New York edition with the headline: Deputy F.B.I. Director, Target of Trump’s Scorn, Is Dismissed From Post. Order Reprints| Today's Paper|Subscribe
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