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FBI Secretly Probed Whether Trump Acted as a Russian Agent After Firing Comey
Newly declassified documents reveal that the FBI opened a previously undisclosed counterintelligence investigation in 2017 into whether Donald Trump was acting “wittingly or unwittingly” on behalf of Russia when he fired FBI Director James Comey. The investigation, known as “Oxferd Comma,” was eventually folded into the broader Mueller investigation and closed without charges against Trump.
U.S. Army photo by Rachel Larue/Arlington National Cemetery/released
The question inside the FBI was extraordinary.
Was the president of the United States acting for Russia?
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Newly released documents show that the FBI considered that possibility after President Donald Trump dismissed then-FBI Director James Comey on May 9, 2017.
The investigation was given the unusual name “Oxferd Comma.”
According to the newly declassified material, investigators were examining whether Trump “may be or has been, wittingly or unwittingly, involved in activities for or on behalf of the Government of the Russian Federation.”
The investigation did not begin in isolation.
It grew out of Crossfire Hurricane, the FBI's 2016 investigation into possible links between Trump's presidential campaign and Russia's efforts to interfere in the election.
That investigation had already become one of the most politically explosive episodes of Trump's first presidency.
Then came Comey's firing.
Trump had publicly criticized Comey's handling of the FBI's investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server.
But the timing immediately attracted attention because Comey was also overseeing the investigation into possible connections between Trump's campaign and Russia.
The FBI subsequently examined whether Trump's decision to remove Comey could itself have been connected to Russian interests.
The newly disclosed records show that the bureau treated the matter as a counterintelligence investigation, meaning investigators were examining whether a foreign government could be influencing or directing a U.S. official.
The documents reportedly describe the case as a sensitive investigative matter, limiting its visibility within the bureau.
But there was skepticism inside the FBI as well.
Records released with the investigation indicate that some FBI officials questioned the basis and direction of the inquiry.
The investigation was eventually incorporated into Special Counsel Robert Mueller's broader investigation after Mueller was appointed on May 17, 2017, just days after Comey's dismissal.
Mueller's investigation lasted nearly two years.
When his report was released in April 2019, it documented extensive Russian interference in the 2016 election and numerous contacts involving Trump campaign associates and Russians.
However, Mueller did not establish that the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.
The “Oxferd Comma” investigation was ultimately closed without charges against Trump.
The episode has now resurfaced because of the Trump administration's decision to declassify the records.
Trump and his allies have long argued that the original Russia investigations were politically motivated and improperly targeted his presidency.
A later review by Special Counsel John Durham also sharply criticized aspects of the FBI's handling of the original Russia investigation, describing its initiation as “seriously flawed.”
But the newly released documents do not, by themselves, establish that the FBI's suspicions were correct.
They establish something narrower and significant: the FBI actually investigated whether Trump's actions could have reflected Russian influence, including the possibility that he was unaware of that influence himself.
That distinction matters.
The documents reveal what investigators suspected in 2017, not proof that Trump was a Russian agent.
And nearly a decade later, the release is reopening one of the most consequential questions of Trump's first presidency.
Not whether the FBI suspected him.
That is now documented.
The question is why the bureau opened the investigation, how much evidence supported it, and why it ultimately went nowhere.
Editor's Note: The newly declassified documents establish that the FBI opened the “Oxferd Comma” counterintelligence investigation. They do not establish that Trump acted as a Russian agent. The investigation ended without charges against him, while Mueller's separate investigation did not establish criminal conspiracy or coordination between the Trump campaign and the Russian government.
