Trump launches furious attack on 'poor little Angel' former FBI chief McCabe after Russia probe revelations

President makes unsubstantiated claims about official and his wife in Twitter tirade

Donald Trump has launched an angry attack on former acting FBI director Andrew McCabe after he revealed why he had ordered an investigation into whether the president obstructed justice.

Mr McCabe suggested he had initiated the probe as a means of safeguarding the ongoing investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.

And, seemingly in response, the president tweeted: "Disgraced FBI Acting Director Andrew McCabe pretends to be a 'poor little Angel' when in fact he was a big part of the Crooked Hillary Scandal & the Russia Hoax - a puppet for Leakin’ James Comey. I.G. report on McCabe was devastating. Part of 'insurance policy' in case I won.

"Many of the top FBI brass were fired, forced to leave, or left. McCabe’s wife received BIG DOLLARS from Clinton people for her campaign - he gave Hillary a pass. McCabe is a disgrace to the FBI and a disgrace to our Country. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!"

The presidential tweet storm follows comments Mr McCabe made in an upcoming CBS interview, an excerpt of which was released on Thursday, in which the former FBI deputy director said he wanted investigations into Mr Trump’s ties to Russia and possible obstruction of justice documented so that they could “not be closed or vanish in the night without a trace.” He also confirmed for the first time that high-level meetings had taken place to determine which of Mr Trump's Cabinet members may have supported invoking the 25th Amendment in the wake of numerous controversies surrounding the Russia investigation.

Mr McCabe said in an interview with CBS' “60 Minutes” that he met with his investigators the day after his boss, James Comey, was fired in May 2017.

He says he wanted to “put the Russia case on absolutely solid ground, in an indelible fashion” to ensure that the case couldn't be closed without a record in the event he also was fired.

The full interview will be released on Sunday. Mr McCabe has a book out next week about his time in the FBI.

“I wrote this book because the president’s attacks on me symbolize his destructive effect on the country as a whole,” Mr McCabe said in a statement issued through his publisher, St. Martin’s. “He is undermining America’s safety and security, and eroding public confidence in its institutions. His attacks on the most crucial institutions of government, and on the professionals who serve within them, should make every American stand up and take notice.”

The publication added in a statement that Mr McCabe would describe “a series of troubling, contradictory, and often bizarre conversations” with Trump and other high officials that led him to believe the “actions of this President and his administration undermine the FBI and the entire intelligence community” and threaten the general public.

His book is likely to draw comparisons to A Higher Loyalty, the best-seller by Mr Comey, whom the president fired in 2017. Both books come from divisions of Macmillan.

Mr McCabe had been with the FBI for more than 20 years when former Attorney General Jeff Sessions fired him in March, just before Mr McCabe’s planned retirement. His ouster came as a report from the Department of Justice’s inspector general faulted him for misleading investigators looking in to the leak of information for a 2016 Wall Street Journal story about the FBI’s probe into the Clinton Foundation. Mr McCabe denied the charges.

Meanwhile, Mr Trump had accused him of bias against Republicans because Mr McCabe’s wife had accepted campaign contributions from the political action committee of then-Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe, a Democrat, during a failed state Senate run.

After Mr McCabe was fired, Mr Trump tweeted “Andrew McCabe FIRED, a great day for the hard working men and women of the FBI - A great day for Democracy.”

Additional reporting by AP.