President Donald Trump said he doesn't have recordings of his conversations with then-FBI Director James Comey, capping weeks of speculation about whether such tapes exist.
The White House had said Trump would likely clarify whether he had tapes of Comey by the end of this week.
"With all of the recently reported electronic surveillance, intercepts, unmasking and illegal leaking of information", Trump said in his latest tweets, he has "no idea" whether there are "tapes" or recordings of the two men's conversations.
Trump says he never recorded his conversations...
In May, Trump tweeted that Comey "better hope that there are no "tapes" of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press!"
That special counsel - Robert Mueller - who was appointed as a direct result of what now looks like a deeply ill-advised Trump tweet, now poses a serious threat to his entire presidency with an investigation into alleged collusion by campaign officials with Russian interference in the United States election, that could branch off in unpredictable directions. The House intelligence committee sent a letter demanding any recordings be turned over for the investigation into Russia's meddling in the 2016 election and whether Trump's campaign colluded.
Earlier his month, Trump was coy about the "tapes" when asked about them at a press conference: "I'll tell you about it over a very short period of time...."
He says the tweet is an example of Trump's "willingness to just kind of make things up". Indeed, Comey could have said he did not recall telling the president that.
There's little doubt that the entire tapes issue represents a serious misstep by the President that put his White House on a perilous political and legal path.
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Trump suggested last month that he may have recorded interactions between himself and Comey in the White House before admitting in a Thursday tweet, to not having such "tapes."
In later Senate hearings, Comey said that tweet got him seriously concerned that Trump might misrepresent their conversations.
Trump hinted at the existence of such "tapes" shortly after his highly controversial firing of Comey.
On May 12, a day after details of a one-on-one dinner he had with Comey were reported by the New York Times, Trump issued an apparent threat to the former Federal Bureau of Investigation director, whom he had recently fired.
The tapes - and the 18-minute gap that existed in the recordings - led to the Presidential Recordings and Materials Preservation Act of 1974, which requires tapes like Nixon's to be preserved as presidential records. But in fact, Trump's bluff has been a tactical win for the president, for two reasons.
Was Trump concerned that he was under surveillance by others while in the Oval Office?
But with Trump's new admission, Democrats were raising questions about why he wrote the original tweet directed at Comey, suggesting it was part of a pattern of obstruction.
He's also brought trouble to his White House.
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