Former FBI Director James Comey, a staunch critic of Donald Trump, was charged with threatening the life of United States President Donald Trump, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche reported on Tuesday.
Comey made a now-deleted Instagram post last year showing the numbers “86 47” formed from seashells.
Trump claimed in an interview with Fox News at the time that “86” was slang for “kill” and that “47” referred to him as the 47th president of the United States.
“He knew exactly what that meant,” Trump said. “It means murder, and he says it loud and clear.”
Comey assured that he will face the new charges against him.
“Well, now they’re back with a photo of seashells on a beach in North Carolina a year ago, and it won’t end here,” he declared in a video posted on social media.
“I remain innocent, I remain fearless and I continue to believe in an independent federal judiciary,” he stressed.
The indictment claims that the reference “86 47” is a “serious expression of an intention to harm the president of the United States.”
Blanche said Comey faces one count of “knowingly making a threat to take life and inflict injury” on Trump and one count of making an interstate threat.
Each of the charges carries a penalty of up to 10 years in prison.
“It’s fair to say that threatening someone’s life is dangerous and potentially a crime,” Blanche said.
Comey explained that he had posted a photo of some shells he had seen during a walk on the beach.
“I didn’t realize that some people would associate those numbers with violence. It never occurred to me but I am opposed to violence of any kind so I deleted the message,” he said.
The indictment against Comey comes three days after a man was arrested for allegedly attempting to assassinate Trump during a dinner in Washington hosted by the White House Correspondents’ Association.
Case dismissed
Comey, 65, was indicted in September for making false statements to Congress, in what many saw as part of a retaliatory campaign by the president against his political opponents.
That accusation was filed days after Trump publicly urged then-Attorney General Pam Bondi to act against the former FBI director.
Judge Cameron Currie dismissed his case on the grounds that the Trump-appointed prosecutor who brought the charges, Lindsey Halligan, was illegally appointed.
Bondi was fired this month, in part because of her failure to secure indictments against Trump’s political adversaries.
Comey was appointed head of the FBI in 2013 by President Barack Obama and was fired by Trump in 2017.
The Republican magnate removed him from office amid an investigation to determine whether any member of Trump’s presidential campaign had collaborated with Moscow to fix the election he won in 2016.
On the same day as the new indictment against the former FBI director, a judge ruled that his daughter Maurene Comey can proceed with a lawsuit alleging that her firing as a federal prosecutor last year was politically motivated.
