Comey's Book Calls Trump 'Unethical,' Compares Presidency to 'Forest Fire'

In an explosive new book expected to bring renewed turmoil to the White House, former FBI director James Comey denounces President Donald Trump as “untethered to truth” and likens the president to a mafia boss, The Guardian reports. A Higher Loyalty will be released Tuesday. Comey was fired by Trump 11 months ago, after Trump allegedly tried to lean on him to shut down an investigation into his former national security adviser Michael Flynn.

After Comey was fired, Rober Mueller was appointed as special counsel to oversee the investigation into Russian election meddling and alleged collusion between Moscow and Trump aides. In his book, Comey describes his first to Trump Tower in January 2017. He writes that Trump’s “face appeared slightly orange, with bright white half-moons under his eyes where I assume he placed small tanning goggles, and impressively coiffed, bright blond hair, which on close inspection looked to be all his. I remember wondering how long it must take him in the morning to get that done.” Comey also talks about a White House meeting with Trump and then chief of staff Reince Priebus in February 2017. Comey writes that since Trump “never stops talking,” the president “pulls all those present into a silent circle of assent.”

“The encounter left me shaken,” he writes, according to The Guardian. “I had never seen anything like it in the Oval Office. As I found myself thrust into the Trump orbit, I once again was having flashbacks to my earlier career as a prosecutor against the mob. The silent circle of assent. The boss in complete control. The loyalty oaths. The us-versus-them worldview. The lying about all things, large and small, in service to some code of loyalty that put the organization above morality and the truth.”