Investigators were “concerned” about President Trump posing a national-security threat months before he fired former FBI Director James Comey, Andrew McCabe says. In an interview with The Atlantic pegged to the release of his book, The Threat, the former FBI deputy director addressed the allegation that the bureau’s decision to open investigations into Trump was out of anger because of the decision to fire Comey. “I could see how that would fit if we had initiated this concern in the wake of Jim’s firing,” McCabe said. “The fact is, we were building to this point for months before Jim was fired. We had several cases already open under the umbrella investigation of the Russia case… and the concern about the president and whether or not he posed a national-security threat that we should be investigating had been building for some time.”

McCabe also addressed Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation, likening his tactics to how the FBI would probe “a cartel or an organized-crime family.” He also said Mueller wouldn’t be intimidated out of investigating Trump’s finances, as some lawmakers have worried: “I know him pretty well. And I have never known him to be intimidated by anything or anyone,” he said. “He is at heart an investigator, and he is not the kind of investigator who’s going to be brushed off of a potential area of investigation because he’s afraid of provoking the ire of the president, or making somebody mad, or getting too close to the boundaries.”