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US President Donald Trump told former FBI director James Comey he had serious concerns about the judgment of his first national security adviser Michael Flynn, according to memos written by Mr Comey and obtained by news agency Associated Press.
The 15 pages of documents contain new details about a series of interactions Mr Comey had with Mr Trump in the weeks before his May 2017 firing.
Those encounters include a White House dinner at which Mr Comey said Mr Trump asked him for his loyalty, and a meeting the following month in which he said the President asked him to end an investigation into Mr Flynn.
According to one memo, Mr Trump complained about Mr Flynn at a private January 2017 dinner with Mr Comey, saying "the guy has serious judgment issues".
He then blamed Mr Flynn for a delay in returning the congratulatory call of an international leader.
"I did not comment at any point during this topic and there was no mention or acknowledgment of any FBI interest in or contact with General Flynn," Mr Comey wrote.
Mr Flynn was fired a month later after White House officials said he had misled them about his Russian contacts during the transition period.
In a separate memo about another meeting, Mr Comey said Mr Trump cleared the Oval Office of other officials and then asked him to end the investigation into Mr Flynn.
The memos also reveal Mr Trump told Mr Comey the leaks of his phone calls to Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto could not have come from the representatives of the respective countries.
Mr Trump told Mr Comey he could not remember saying some of the things quoted in the leaked transcripts, adding, "and they say I have one of the world's greatest memories."
Mr Comey's memos also say the President raised "that golden showers thing" in discussions with him.
The memos record that the President denied claims, reportedly included in a secret intelligence dossier, that he paid prostitutes to urinate on each other in a Russian hotel.
Tweeting after the release of the memos, Mr Trump said said they showed clearly that there was "NO COLLUSION and NO OBSTRUCTION".
In a Senate hearing in June, Mr Comey had told Congress: "I knew there might come a day when I would need a record of what had happened, not just to defend myself, but to defend the FBI and our integrity as an institution and the independence of our investigative function."
The memos were provided to Congress as House Republicans escalated criticism of the Justice Department, threatening to subpoena the documents and questioning officials.
In a letter sent to three Republican House committee chairmen, Assistant Attorney-General Stephen Boyd wrote that the department was sending a classified version of the memos and an unclassified version.
The department released Mr Boyd's letter publicly but did not release the memos.
Justice officials had allowed some representatives to view the memos but had never provided copies to Congress.
Mr Boyd wrote that the department had also provided the memos to several Senate committees.
Mr Comey is on a publicity tour to promote his new book, A Higher Loyalty.
Special counsel Robert Mueller is investigating potential ties between Russia and Mr Trump's 2016 campaign as well as possible obstruction of justice by the president.
Mr Boyd said the decision to allow the release of the memos "does not alter the department's traditional obligation to protect from public disclosure witness statements and other documents obtained during an ongoing investigation".
Mr Comey said in an interview on Thursday with CNN he was "fine" with the Justice Department turning his memos over to Congress.
"I think what folks will see if they get to see the memos is I've been consistent since the very beginning, right after my encounters with President Trump, and I'm consistent in the book and tried to be transparent in the book as well," he said.
Last week, the Republican chairmen of three House committees demanded the memos by Monday.
The Justice Department asked for more time, and the representatives agreed.
AP
Topics: donald-trump, government-and-politics, law-crime-and-justice, united-states
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