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President Trump made clear early Saturday that he viewed Attorney General Jeff Sessions' decision to fire FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe as a “great day for Democracy.”
“Andrew McCabe FIRED, a great day for the hardworking men and women of the FBI — a great day for Democracy!” Trump wrote on Twitter, before deriding former FBI Director James Comey, who Trump fired in May 2017.
Later, he reiterated his frequent refrain that there was "no collusion" between Russia and the Trump campaign and insinuated instead there was leaking and corruption "at the highest levels of the FBI, Justice & State."
Sessions accepted the agency’s recommendation to fire McCabe late Friday — two days before the veteran FBI official was slated to retire and become eligible for full pension and benefits.
Related: Sessions fires McCabe before he can retire
The FBI's Office of Professional Responsibility proposed McCabe’s termination after the Justice Department's inspector general concluded McCabe had made “unauthorized disclosure to the news media and lacked candor — including under oath — on multiple occasions.”
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But in a statement Friday, McCabe, who has spent two decades at the FBI, said he viewed his firing as a partisan decision that is part of the Trump administration’s “ongoing war on the FBI and the efforts of the Special Counsel investigation.”
Related: McCabe: Trump wants to destroy me to stop Mueller probe
The firing and Trump's response early Saturday sparked outrage from Democrats and former members of the intelligence community who have cast the decision to remove McCabe as something akin to a political hit-job.
John Brennan, the former director of the CIA, slammed what he described as Trump's “venality, moral turpitude, and political corruption.”
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle called for the swift release of the inspector general’s report so that the public could judge the merits of McCabe’s removal.
Adam Schiff, D-Calif., a ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, said the absence of the IG's report makes McCabe's removal appeared overtly political.
“That it comes after the president urged the DOJ to deprive McCabe of his pension, and after his testimony, gives the action an odious taint,” Schiff tweeted.
In contrast, Republican Mark Meadows, chair of the House Freedom Caucus, told Fox News host Laura Ingraham Friday, that he supported the decision to remove McCabe.
“No one ever gets fired from the FBI and DOJ without there being real credible evidence so the suggestion that this is a political hit job is just not accurate,” Meadows said.
