TAPPER: And CNN, Evan, spoke to Comey in an exclusive interview back in May of this year for a CNN original series. Take a listen to just a little bit of what he had to say.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
COMEY: Yes, I’m still considered a villain in MAGA world. Hope I said that correctly. Although I’ve offended enough people in MAGA world, it doesn’t matter at this point. I’m not sure exactly why that is. I — I often joke I’m the relationship that Trump can’t get over, wakes up in the middle of the night thinking about me and how I’m living my best life.
I think it has some combination of I really have had a happy, productive life since then and — and that I spoke out about him and that despite their absolute best efforts, they were never able — never able to get me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: It didn’t mean, Evan, that they weren’t going to continue to try, of course.
EVAN PEREZ: Absolutely. Look, I mean, there’s a lot of things that we know about James Comey, including — and there’s a lot of hubris about the way he’s approached things over the years. And he certainly has a lot of — you know, he has a very strong belief in — in his capabilities. He knows he can fend off a lot of things. What I think he didn’t really account for is how much there would be an effort inside the Justice Department, new Justice Department this year to try to find a way to do this with the deadline that was fast approaching, which is approaching on — on Tuesday, right, the expiration of the statute of limitations for this — this allegation.
And look, if you look at the allegations and you look at these documents, Jake, you and I have been talking about this, you know, this was a makeable case. This is a case that a lot of aggressive prosecutors could have possibly brought. There are a lot of other things, though, that are around it. And what Comey is referring to is the president’s obsession with him. And I think that’s where the weakness of the case lies.
A lot of this — the President’s comments over the weekend, some of the comments today are only going to make this case much more difficult for the prosecutors who are going to have to bring this to trial. Look, the defense briefs are writing themselves —
TAPPER: Right.
PEREZ: — Donald Trump is writing them for them.
TAPPER: (LAUGHS)