President Donald Trump said he learned from a fallen U.S. leader not to fire those investigating possible wrongdoing one day after the Justice Department said it wanted to withdraw charges against his former adviser Michael Flynn.
"I learned a lot from Richard Nixon. Don't fire people," Trump said in an hour-long interview with Fox News Friday morning. "I learned a lot. I study history."
The move by the Justice Department Thursday to vacate the prosecution of former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn for lying to FBI agents came after weeks of demands by Trump and his allies to redress what the president often calls a Democratic "hoax" and a "witch hunt" intended to tar his administration.
Trump _ whose signature line on his reality television show was 'You're fired' _ said Friday that he refrained from firing many of the law enforcement officials investigating Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election and his campaign's possible involvement. But he said the exception was firing former FBI Director James Comey.
"When I fired Comey, you know what hit the fan," Trump said.
Trump said that there were some differences between him and former President Richard Nixon, who resigned from office before he could be impeached.
"Of course, there was one difference, one big difference," Trump said. "No. 1 he may have been guilty. And No. 2 he had tapes all over the place. I wasn't guilty. I did nothing wrong. And there were no tapes."
He added that he wished there were tapes.
