The FBI’s Russia investigation did not stop at Trump campaign aides.
One week after President Donald Trump fired FBI Director James Comey in May 2017, bureau officials opened a counterintelligence investigation aimed directly at Trump, according to newly declassified memos released by the White House and reported by Fox News.
The closely guarded probe carried an unusual codename: “Oxferd Comma”—with “Oxford” apparently misspelled for reasons that remain unclear.
But the questions behind the name were anything but trivial.
In a May 16, 2017, opening memo, investigators said they sought to determine whether Trump was “directed by, controlled by, and/or coordinated activities with, the Russian Federation in a manner constituting a threat to the national security of the United States and/or a violation of federal criminal statutes,” according to Fox News.
The FBI also widened its focus to possible obstruction. The memo’s wording, as released, stated: “In addition, this investigation will also seek to determine whether President Trump and others yet to be named obstructed and/or conspiracy to obstruct any associated FBI investigation.”
In other words, Comey’s firing triggered an extraordinary inquiry into whether the sitting president was acting in concert with a hostile foreign power—and whether he or others had tried to derail the bureau’s work.
From Comey’s Firing to a Probe of the President
Comey, appointed by President Barack Obama, led the FBI from 2013 until Trump dismissed him in 2017.
During that tenure, Comey oversaw two investigations that became defining controversies of the 2016 election. The FBI examined Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server, and Comey notified Congress shortly before Election Day that agents had found emails that “appear to be pertinent” to that case.
Comey also oversaw the launch of “Crossfire Hurricane,” the FBI investigation opened in July 2016 after the bureau received information that Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos had suggested Russia possessed damaging material about Clinton.
When Trump fired Comey, the administration initially pointed to the FBI director’s handling of the Clinton email investigation. The dismissal, however, rapidly intensified scrutiny of the president and the Russia inquiry.
On May 17, 2017, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appointed Robert Mueller as special counsel. Mueller took over the existing Russia investigation and expanded the federal inquiry.
Mueller’s final report, released in 2019, found that Russia sought to interfere in the 2016 election through a social media influence operation and the hacking and release of Democratic emails. The investigation did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government.
The report also examined potential obstruction but did not make a traditional prosecutorial judgment on whether Trump committed a crime.
According to the newly released memos, the “Oxferd Comma” investigation was closed on April 9, 2019, as Mueller’s work neared completion.
Durham’s Review Reignited Questions About the FBI
The bureau’s handling of the Trump-Russia investigation later came under examination by special counsel John Durham, whom Attorney General William Barr appointed to review the origins of Crossfire Hurricane.
Durham’s 2023 report concluded that the FBI lacked sufficient factual grounds to open the full investigation and departed from its usual standards. His findings fueled renewed allegations that political bias shaped the bureau’s decisions.
Separately declassified material from an annex to Durham’s report also showed officials scrutinized intelligence alleging that Clinton allies planned to link Trump to Russian President Vladimir Putin in order to shift attention from Clinton’s email controversy.
“Raising the theme of ‘Putin’s support for Trump’ to the level of the Olympics scandal would divert the constituents’ attention from the investigation of Clinton’s compromised electronic correspondence,” the annex reads, according to Fox News.
The annex also included a 2016 message attributed to Leonard Benardo, an official with the Open Society Foundations network who had done business in Moscow in the 1980s.
“Julie says it will be a long-term affair to demonize Putin and Trump. Now it is good for a post-convention bounce. Later the FBI will put more oil into the fire,” Benardo wrote.
The appendix said “Julie” appeared to refer to Clinton foreign policy adviser Julianne Smith.
The newly disclosed “Oxferd Comma” memos add another striking chapter to the fight over the Russia investigation. They show that, after Comey’s firing, the FBI was not merely asking whether people around Trump had improper Russian ties. It was formally investigating whether the president himself was under Moscow’s direction and posed a threat to the United States.
