Outside the Beltway

It’s Official, James Comey Is On Twitter

Doug Mataconis
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FBI Director James Comey

Ever since he was fired by President Trump, it’s been rumored that former F.B.I. Director James Comey had a “secret” Twitter account that followed a limited number of people or institutions, all of which had some kind of connection to Comey. Well, now, that secret account is a secret no longer, and it’s leading to speculation of another kind about Comey’s future plans:

Former FBI Director James Comey is officially on Twitter.

Benjamin Wittes, a journalist and friend of Comey, confirmed on Monday that the Twitter account @FormerBu belongs to the ex-FBI director not long after it posted a photo of a person appearing to be Comey.

“Ok, in light of this latest tweet, I will confirm that @ is, in fact, James Comey himself,” Wittes tweeted.

The Twitter account, which goes by the name Reinhold Niebuhr, posted a tweet earlier on Monday that included a picture that appears to show Comey standing on a highway in Iowa. The author of the post promised to “try to tweet in useful ways.”

“Goodbye Iowa. On the road home. Gotta get back to writing. Will try to tweet in useful ways,” he tweeted.

Other recent tweets from the account show scenic pictures from different places, including Iowa.

Here’s the tweet in question:

There’s no question that the person pictured in the photograph is, in fact, Comey and the fact that he’s wearing running shoes is likely to lead to some of the same speculation that other tweets on the feed from Iowa over the weekend have raised, namely that Comey is considering running for political office of some kind, with the fact that he’s been in Iowa leading some to wonder, or at least joke, about him running for President in 2020:

Whether Comey is actually considering running for any office, much less President is of course speculation at this point. What’s perhaps more interesting is the reference in today’s tweet about writing, suggesting that Comey is working on a book of some kind. Given his former position in government and his dealings with the President, that could end up being a very interesting book indeed.

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5 responses to “It’s Official, James Comey Is On Twitter”

  1. Neil Hudelson Avatar
    Neil Hudelson

    Unfortunately I can’t find the article now, but some internet sleuths did a good job of unmasking the “Reinhold Niebuhr” account all the way back in early 2017 or mid-late 2016. If I’m not mistaken, they figured it out by looking at interactions with Benjamin Wittes’ account, and connecting the “RN” name to some essays Comey wrote about Neibuhr. There was some other, stronger, evidence they had uncovered but my memory isn’t that great.

    Nice to see it confirmed, however.

  2. Doug Mataconis Avatar
    Doug Mataconis

    @Neil Hudelson:

    Yea I remember that article too and like you I lost track of it.

    Now it’s been confirmed that they were right.

  3. Doug Mataconis Avatar
    Doug Mataconis

    @Neil Hudelson:

    Ah, here’s the article I read that tracked down Comey’s account. It was locked at the time, meaning that only people he approved could follow him or see his tweets.

    https://gizmodo.com/this-is-almost-certainly-james-comey-s-twitter-account-1793843641

  4. Mister Bluster Avatar
    Mister Bluster

    Iowa? Could be.
    In addition to Iowa I have worked the rural roads of Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, Michigan, Wisconson and Kansas. This scene could be from any of those States and likely others.
    I did attempt to zoom in on the back side of the No Passing Zone sign on the right shoulder to see if I could detect a road district inventory tag but my Safari zoom in button doesn’t zoom in enough.

  5. JohnMcC Avatar
    JohnMcC

    Maybe I’m dense and the earlier ref’s to ‘he’s running’ went over my head – but ‘Run, Forrest, run!’ came to my mind.

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