US President Donald Trump told former FBI Director James Comey to back off from a probe into former national security adviser Michael Flynn, Mr Comey has revealed in a new statement.
James Comey, left, says Donald Trump, right, tol him, "I expect loyalty". Photo: AFP
In the written statement - posted online - Mr Comey said Mr Trump told him: "I need loyalty. I expect loyalty."
Mr Comey, who will testify in person to the Senate Intelligence Committee tomorrow, will use his opening statement to recount a dinner he had with Mr Trump on 27 January, a week after the president took office, according to a copy of the statement posted on the Senate panel's website.
'It sounds like a script from The Sopranos' - US correspondent Simon Marks
Mr Comey said that during the dinner Mr Trump asked him if he wanted to stay on as Federal Bureau of Investigation director. Mr Comey said he became concerned that Mr Trump was trying to create "some sort of patronage relationship."
In the statement, Mr Comey added: "That concerned me greatly, given the FBI's traditionally independent status in the executive branch."
Read the full statement online here.
A matter of intelligence
Meanwhile, US Senators have angrily confronted top intelligence officials at a congressional hearing who refused to discuss whether Mr Trump had pressured them to intervene in an FBI probe into Russia and the 2016 election.
Both National Security Agency (NSA) director Admiral Mike Rogers and the Director of National Intelligence, Dan Coats, told the Senate Intelligence Committee they believed their conversations with the president were confidential.
Several exasperated senators pressed the officials on why they would not answer questions.
Admiral Rogers said he had never been directed to do anything illegal, immoral or inappropriate during his time as NSA director, while Mr Coats said he had never felt pressured to intervene in the shaping of intelligence.
- Reuters