During a press briefing on Friday, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) claimed former FBI Director James Comey saying President Trump was not under investigation for ties to Russia is merely semantics.
“Some of us in the media have to take our lumps for saying the president is under investigation for Russia when Comey, yesterday, said he wasn’t,” a reporter told Pelosi. “Do you have any readout on how we’ve done and how we can fix things moving forward?”
Pelosi responded by mentioning the “power of words,” claiming that while Comey might have said Trump was not being investigated for ties to Russia, that doesn’t mean his campaign isn’t under investigation:
“Well, again, it’s about words,” Pelosi said. “You know, it’s all about words. And the president has to understand this: words spoken by the President of the United States weigh a ton. It’s not like any word that any of the rest of us would say. I mean, you had the power of words. That’s what you do. You know the power of words. But spoken by the President of the United States? They weigh a ton. So when they, ‘Am I under investigation?’ ‘No, you’re not,’ that doesn’t necessarily mean your campaign is not under investigation.”
The reporter who asked the question confronted Pelosi for her response, saying, for those in the media, “it’s time for us to say, well, it’s time for us to say we got it wrong.’”
Pelosi responded by mentioning her calls for an “independent outside commission” to look into Trump’s ties to Russia.
“We have an outside commission, an independent outside commission that looks into it and we make sure public opinion is aware of the fact that this is important,” Pelosi responded, before connecting the topic to financial stability and jobs.