Rep. Adam Schiff Adam Bennett SchiffOvernight Defense: House to vote on military justice bill spurred by Vanessa Guillén death | Biden courts veterans after Trump's military controversies Intelligence chief says Congress will get some in-person election security briefings Democrats, advocates seethe over Florida voting rights ruling MORE (D-Calif.) says that “nobody buys” President Trump’s explanation for firing former FBI Director James Comey.

Schiff, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said Thursday on CNN’s "OutFront" that "there's no mystery" that "Democrats have a big problem with what Comey did and how he handled the [Hillary] Clinton investigation."

“Had the president agreed with those criticisms during the campaign, that would have been one thing,” Schiff said of Democrats' criticism about the former FBI chief's handling of the probe into Clinton's use of a private email server while serving as secretary of State.

“But for a president who applauded the director’s actions at the time, now months later and months further into this investigation into Russia, an investigation that the director was pursuing, to use that as the justification – nobody buys it.”

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Trump on Thursday undercut statements from White House officials about the circumstances of Comey's firing.

Vice President Pence and senior White House officials had initially said Tuesday that Trump had fired Comey on the recommendation of Attorney General Jeff Sessions Jefferson (Jeff) Beauregard SessionsTrump's policies on refugees are as simple as ABCs Ocasio-Cortez, Velázquez call for convention to decide Puerto Rico status White House officials voted by show of hands on 2018 family separations: report MORE and his deputy, Rod Rosenstein.

The Trump administration circulated Rosenstein's assessment that "the FBI's reputation and credibility have suffered substantial damage" under Comey since last year.

The document criticized Comey's handling of the FBI's probe into the private email server Clinton used before becoming the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee.

But Trump broke from that narrative during a Thursday interview, arguing he had made up his mind without Justice Department input.

“I was going to fire regardless of the recommendation,” he told NBC News’s Lester Holt.

Deputy press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders insisted later that the White House’s account of the events surrounding Comey’s ouster was “consistent.”

Comey’s ouster came amid the FBI’s probe of Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential race, including possible ties between Moscow and the Trump campaign.

“It would be one thing if this was credible, it was done at a different time,” Schiff said of Trump's decision to fire Comey.

“But plainly this is being used, or at least it was up until today, as a dodge ... And I think that was exposed.”