United States President Donald Trump quizzed the man he was considering as temporary Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) director how he had voted in the 2016 presidential election.
The question was aimed at the bureau's deputy director Andrew G. McCabe, reports the Washington Post.
Shortly after Trump fired his FBI director James B.
Comey in May, he summoned McCabe to the Oval Office for a get-to-know-you meeting.
Also, and at that time, the president openly discussed the need for any successor to be "loyal."
According to several current and former US officials, the two men exchanged pleasantries, but before long, Trump, asked McCabe a pointed question: Whom did he vote for in the 2016 election, to which McCabe replied in negative, stating that he had not voted.
The week that Comey was fired, McCabe met with Trump a handful of times, a person familiar with the meetings said, according to reports.
McCabe, 49, who has spent more than two decades at the bureau, found the conversation with Trump "disturbing," said one former US official.
According to the New York Times, a White House official confirmed Tuesday night that the president had asked the question.
According to the report, one person put forth that the Trump-McCabe conversation is of interest to special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, who is probing into the alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 US Presidential election campaign.
(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)