Trump accuses Comey of lying, says he’s ‘100-per-cent’ willing to testify under oath

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U.S. President Donald Trump accused former FBI director James Comey of lying in testimony before Congress and said he would be "100-per-cent" willing to share his own version of events under oath.

Speaking at a press conference at the White House on Friday afternoon, Mr. Trump denied that he had urged Mr. Comey to drop an active investigation, as Mr. Comey testified on Thursday.

"No collusion, no obstruction, he's a leaker, but we want to get back to running our great country," Mr. Trump said. "Frankly, James Comey confirmed a lot of what I said and some of the things he said just weren't true."

Related: Trump won't say if Comey conversations were taped

Related: Comey says he was fired over Russia probe, accuses Trump of lying

Earlier on Friday, the President seized on Mr. Comey's admission that he had passed an unclassified memo detailing an encounter with Mr. Trump to a friend, who then shared it with a New York Times reporter. "WOW, Comey is a leaker!" Mr. Trump wrote on Twitter.

Mr. Trump's personal lawyer, Marc Kasowitz, plans to file a complaint next week with a Justice Department watchdog about Mr. Comey's disclosure of conversations with the President, according to Reuters. It's not clear what action, if any, would be taken in response: Mr. Comey is now a private citizen and revealing unclassified information in that capacity is not a crime.

Mr. Trump's comments are part of an uphill battle by the administration to undermine the credibility of Mr. Comey, who has a reputation as a rare truth-teller in Washington. At the press conference, Mr. Trump also declined to confirm or deny whether there were tapes of his conversations with Mr. Comey, but said, "You're going to be very disappointed when you hear the answer." The former FBI director said Thursday he hoped such recordings existed – a prospect first raised by Mr. Trump on Twitter.

The issue of whether recordings exist of the one-on-one meetings between Mr. Trump and Mr. Comey is just one of several intriguing questions raised by the former FBI director's testimony. At the hearing, Mr. Comey offered tantalizing clues about the future course of an investigation that will cast a shadow over the Trump administration.

Several topics raised by Mr. Comey are likely already under scrutiny by Robert Mueller, the special counsel appointed by the Justice Department. They include the extent of the contacts between Attorney-General Jeff Sessions and Russian officials, as well as the contents of a dossier prepared by a former British spy on alleged efforts by the Kremlin to influence Mr. Trump and his advisers.

Mr. Mueller is leading the probe into possible collusion between Mr. Trump's advisers and the Russian government ahead of the 2016 election. On Friday, the National Law Journal reported that Mr. Mueller has recruited the U.S. government's top expert on criminal law to lend his expertise to the investigation.

In his testimony on Thursday, Mr. Comey described conferring with senior leadership at the FBI and deciding not to tell Mr. Sessions – his direct superior – about a disturbing conversation he had with Mr. Trump on Feb. 14 where the President pressed him to drop an investigation into former national security adviser Michael Flynn.

"Our judgment, as I recall, was that [Mr. Sessions] was … inevitably going to, recuse himself [from the Russia probe] for a variety of reasons," Mr. Comey said. "We also were aware of facts that I can't discuss in an open setting that would make his continued engagement in a Russia-related investigation problematic."

Mr. Sessions recused himself from the ongoing Russia investigation on March 2 after it emerged he had met twice with Sergey Kislyak, the Russian ambassador to the U.S., but did not disclose those contacts under oath at his confirmation hearing.

NBC News reported Friday that one of the "facts" Mr. Comey was referring to was classified intelligence suggesting an undisclosed third meeting between Mr. Sessions and Mr. Kislyak. A spokesperson for Mr. Sessions has denied such a meeting took place. Mr. Sessions is due to testify before Congress next week on an unrelated topic, but is now likely to face questions about the meetings.

Mr. Comey was also questioned about the contents of an unverified dossier prepared by Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence officer tasked with compiling potentially damaging information on Mr. Trump for his political opponents. The dossier included salacious claims about Mr. Trump engaging prostitutes in Russia – something the President strongly denied to Mr. Comey in a meeting in early January – as well as descriptions of collusion between Trump associates and Russian agents.

Richard Burr, the Republican chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, asked Mr. Comey whether the FBI had been able to confirm any criminal allegations contained in the dossier. Mr. Comey responded that it wasn't a question he could answer "in an open setting because it goes into the details of the investigation." That could mean it is possible the FBI has verified something in the dossier, or that Mr. Comey could not discuss the methods the FBI used to reach a conclusion.

"The things that Director Comey said he couldn't talk about are certainly as significant as the things he did talk about," said Claire Finkelstein, an expert on criminal law and professor at the University of Pennsylvania. His answer was a way of suggesting that the dossier is "very likely confirmable."

Another topic raised in Mr. Comey's testimony that could re-emerge to haunt Mr. Trump is the role of the Russian bank Vnesheconombank, or VEB. Angus King, a senator from Maine, asked Mr. Comey, "What do you know about the Russian bank VEB?" Mr. Comey responded: "Nothing that I can talk about in an open setting."

State-owned VEB has provided financing for projects promoted by Russian President Vladimir Putin and is currently under U.S. sanctions. The bank's chairman, Sergey Gorkov, graduated from Russia's training institute for intelligence officers. In December, Mr. Gorkov met with Jared Kushner, Mr. Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser, at Trump Tower.