President Trump asked Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe during an Oval Office meeting last year whom he voted for in the 2016 election, according to a new report.
The Washington Post reports Trump invited McCabe to the White House after he fired former FBI Director James Comey last May. McCabe was the acting FBI director at the time.
Current and former U.S. officials told the Post that Trump and McCabe had a casual conversation before Trump asked McCabe who he voted for in the 2016 presidential election. McCabe reportedly told Trump that he didn’t vote.
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Trump also reportedly expressed anger at McCabe over the thousands of dollars in donations his wife, a Democrat, received for her failed Virginia state Senate bid in 2015 from a political action committee led by former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D), who is closely tied to the Clintons.
One former U.S. official told the Post that McCabe thought the conversation with Trump was “disturbing,” and one person told the newspaper that special counsel Robert Mueller is interested in the talk.
McCabe was one of several candidates Trump interviewed to replace Comey as FBI director. Trump ultimately tapped Christopher Wray to lead the bureau.
The report that Trump asked McCabe whom he voted for in 2016 follows an Axios report Monday that said Wray threatened to resign after Attorney General Jeff Sessions pressured him to remove McCabe from his post.
Sessions also allegedly told White House counsel Don McGahn about Wray’s response to the pressure for him to fire McCabe. McGahn replied by telling Sessions that McCabe wasn’t worth losing Wray, according to Axios.
Trump on Tuesday denied that Wray threatened to resign in response to pressure from Sessions to force out McCabe.
“No. He didn’t at all. He did not even a little bit,” Trump told reporters.
Trump has regularly criticized the donations that McCabe’s wife received for her political bid, firing off several tweets last month blasting McCabe over the donations.
Republicans have used the donations to call into question McCabe’s role in the probe into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server as secretary of State as well as the Justice Department’s investigation into Russian interference during the 2016 election.
However, the FBI said in documents released earlier this month that McCabe did not have any role in the probe while his wife ran for office.
Updated: 8:20 p.m.