Comey shares immediate reaction after coming across 'silly picture' of '86 47' shells
May 19, 2025
Former FBI Director James Comey spoke to MSNBC's Nicolle Wallace on Monday, describing finding the shells on the beach that he posted on his Instagram account last week, which caused an uproar.
Comey said he and his wife were walking on the beach when they came across the shells that spelled out "86 47." At first, Comey said his wife wondered why someone would put their address in the sand.
The Trump foe said that it occurred to him that it could be a political message. His wife, he said, was once a server, and recalled "86" being used in the restaurant industry. She said they'd use it when they ran out of an item on the menu. He said that when he was a kid, they used "86" to mean get out of somewhere.
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Wallace shared a short history of the term at the top of the segment, saying it came from an address of a back door in a restaurant in New York in the Prohibition era. When the cops were coming, it became a term for running out the back door.
President Donald Trump's team has spent the past several days trying to turn the number "86" into a threat of violence and calling for Comey to be "behind bars."
Comey then revealed that he spent the first Trump term being targeted by the government, so this is nothing unusual for him.
"I regret the distraction and the controversy around it. But again, it's hard to have regret about something that, even in hindsight, looks to me to be totally innocent for the reasons you said," Comey said about the MAGA anger.
"In the Trump era, I've been investigated a lot, audited a lot, and so it's not my first rodeo," said Comey. "I'm in some strange way, the relationship he can't get over. Maybe because I've lived a happy, productive life since leaving, but this has just been a distraction in that life."
He noted that Trump has called for him to be investigated or incarcerated dozens of times.
"I went through the mother of all IRS audits, which cost me thousands of dollars, but I got a $347 refund at the end. It turned out I had overpaid my taxes. But just again and again and again, I really thought that I was done. I was in another life. I was a grandfather and an author wearing sweaters and jeans, and then went for a walk on the beach and posted a silly picture of shells that I thought was a clever way to express a political viewpoint. And actually, I still think it is. I don't see it the way some people are still saying it is, but again, I don't want any part of any violence. I've never been associated with violence, and so that's why I took it down."
See the interview clip below or at the link here.
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