Alan Dershowitz, Pete Hoekstra: Trump Should Have Fired Comey

Civil rights attorney Alan Dershowitz told Newsmax TV on Wednesday that President Donald Trump should have asked for FBI Director James Comey's resignation before dismissing him.

"Comey should not have been the head of the FBI," the Harvard Law School professor emeritus told "Newsmax Now" host Miranda Khan. "If he didn't resign, he probably should have been fired.

"But I don't think he should have been fired at this time by this president whose White House staff is under investigation by Comey.

"It creates the appearance – not the reality – the appearance of a conflict of interest."

But former House Intelligence Committee Chairman Pete Hoekstra told Khan that Trump instead "gave James Comey a little bit of leeway" before letting him go.

That flexibility, Hoekstra argued, was: "'I'm going to let the Justice Department, the new attorney general [Jeff Sessions], his deputy [Rod Rosenstein] – they're going to decide what the future is of James Comey, because they're going to have to live with the director of the FBI.'"

"They reached the conclusion that they needed a new director," Hoekstra said, "and this is consistent."

Dershowitz's new book is "Electile Dysfunction: A Guide for Unaroused Voters." Hoekstra's latest work "Architects of Disaster: The Destruction of Libya."

• Alan Dershowitz: Comey 'Lost His Credibility'
• Pete Hoekstra: Dems Should Applaud James Comey's Firing