"James Comey is a man of honour and integrity, and he has led the Federal Bureau of Investigation well in extraordinary circumstances".
Comey was speaking to agents at the FBI's field office in Los Angeles when the news broke.
Trump's dismissal of Comey was criticized by Democrats and some said the president fired him because the FBI was investigating alleged links between Moscow and the Trump campaign.
Trump shocked Washington last night, announcing that Comey had been "terminated and removed from office" less than a week after he testified before Congress.
"No more excuses: We need an independent special prosecutor to investigate the Trump Administration's ties to Russian Federation".
Trump told Comey in a letter that he was following the recommendations of Attorney General Jeff Sessions and his deputy, Rod Rosenstein, who criticized Comey's controversial handling of an investigation into Clinton's use of a private email server. Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from any Trump-Russia investigation in March after the Justice Department acknowledged he had spoken twice with the Russian ambassador previous year and had failed to disclose the contacts during his Senate confirmation process. Comey's deputy, Andrew McCabe, has been named interim director.
The only Federal Bureau of Investigation director to be fired was William Sessions, who was sacked in 1993 by President Bill Clinton.
Barclay's shareholders to vote on whether to re-elect Jes Staley
He has apologised for the incident and referred himself to regulators. The group's members hold about a quarter of the bank's shares.
The firing of top officials like Sally Yates and Preet Bharara, and now Comey does not seem to be a coincidence, Schumer said. "In order to preserve the integrity of the investigation and the government, we need a special prosecutor to probe the possible collusion between Donald Trump's campaign and Russian government officials".
Already Republican John McCain is calling for a special committee to investigate Russia's interference in the 2016 election.
An FBI official, who was not authorized to speak to reporters and so asked not to be identified, said the staff meeting would explore next steps for the law-enforcement agency. But the impact of removing an independent FBI director who was leading an investigation with potentially dire ramifications was not lost in the dramatic removal of the nation's top law enforcement official.
After Cooper asked why Trump chose to fire Comey at this stage of the game, he told Conway that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer called the Comey firing a "coverup".
"Donald Trump's decision to fire him now, in the midst of an investigation into Trump associates and their ties to Russian Federation, is outrageous", he charged. "No charges. Wow! #RiggedSystem", Trump tweeted after Comey announced that Clinton wouldn't face charges.
"You are making a big mistake", Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement, suggesting dismissing Comey was part of a bid by the Trump administration to "cover up" any wrongdoing regarding the Russia-related investigations.
This was the first, and so far only, thing that Donald Trump has publicly said about the firing of FBI Director James Comey; the tweet came about five hours after the news broke. A search has begun to replace Comey, who was appointed to the position by President Barack Obama in 2013.
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