And given Trump's obsession with news coverage and belief that he has been unfairly maligned in the Russian Federation probe, his reaction to Comey's testimony - possibly on Twitter - is likely to add to the atmospherics of a seminal political moment.
"The testimony that former FBI Director James Comey is expected to deliver today makes clear that Congress must begin impeachment proceedings immediately".
Later, Trump's oldest son, Donald Trump Jr, went on a Twitter rampage to defend his father and referred to the testimony as a joke.
"He wrote that Trump said during a private meeting in the Oval Office: "'I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go.
Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate panel, described Comey's prepared testimony as "disturbing".
Spectators, a lot of them young congressional staffers, began lining up outside the Senate Intelligence Committee's hearing room hours before the doors opened.
"My judgment was that I needed to get that out into the public square", he said.
Trump abruptly fired Comey as director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation on May 9, admitting later that the Russian Federation probe was on his mind at the time.
"To my former colleagues: I am so sorry that I didn't get the chance to say goodbye to you properly".
"Mr. Comey has now finally confirmed publicly what he repeatedly told President Trump privately".
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"That concerned me because that language tracked how the campaign was talking about the FBI's work and that's concerning", Comey said.
He said it rang in his ears as "will no one rid me of this meddlesome priest", paraphrasing a quote attributed to English King Henry II that courtiers took to mean he wanted the Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Becket murdered in the year 1170.
Mr Flynn was sacked less than a month into the Trump White House after it was determined that he had misled Vice President Mike Pence about conversations he had with Russian Ambassador to the US Sergey Kislyak, saying that he had not discussed sanctions on Russia related to meddling in the 2016 election even though he had.
In his testimony, Comey said he documented all his meetings with Trump and took notes as he thought Trump would lie about what he said. Trump felt "completely and totally vindicated" by that part of the written testimony, according to his outside counsel, Marc Kasowitz. Democrats and some Republicans on the committee will use Thursday's hearing to press for further details of any attempts by Trump to blunt the Russian Federation investigation.
Comey's prepared testimony does not full answer that question, though he does say he asked Attorney General Jeff Sessions to help prevent him having any direct communication with the president in the future.
"James Comey better hope that there are no "tapes" of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press!" he tweeted.
This, as the Washington Post has underlined, is a fairly unusual thing for someone in Comey's position to do-though Comey's position was beyond unusual-and demonstrates a rather extreme degree of concern (although Donald Trump, Jr., who has been tweeting heavily in his father's notable absence, took it in a different, more deranged direction).
"I'm good with it", Comey said.
In essence, this comes down to a showdown between two versions of the same events - one offered by Trump, the other presented by the respected Federal Bureau of Investigation director whom he fired. He also apologized to the bureau for not being able to say goodbye to them when he was sacked.
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