



For Sandra Younger, a 50-year-old from San Diego, Comey's exit reinforced her suspicion "something fishy" was going on with the president and Russia. She said it was inappropriate to fire Comey given that he was overseeing the Russia investigation.



"If I had nothing to hide and someone wanted to investigate, I would say, 'Go ahead, do your thing, I don't care, because you won't find anything,'" said Younger, a Democrat who imports jewelry supplies. She added of Trump: "He seems to be buddy-buddy with these epic creeps."



But William Shepherd, a maintenance worker from Anderson, Indiana, felt it was the president's prerogative to choose his FBI director. He said he was untroubled by claims Trump tried to persuade Comey to back off the investigation, saying those revelations only emerged after Comey was fired and wanted to defend himself.



"These headlines don't really concern me, although they are attention-grabbers," said Shepherd, a 40-year-old Republican.



Of the six in 10 Americans who think Trump tried to obstruct or impede the investigation, most are Democrats and independents. Only a quarter of Republicans feel Trump meddled in the probe.



The poll began the day before Comey testified publicly before the Senate intelligence committee and continued through Sunday. Three percent of interviews were conducted before the hearing.



"I've not ever been a particular fan of Mr. Comey's," said James Shaw, 53, of Olney, Illinois. "But he's an honest broker. I don't think he's politically motivated. I don't think he's partisan."



Americans are mixed on whether the Justice Department investigation, now led by Mueller, can be fair and impartial. Twenty-six percent are very or extremely confident it can be. Thirty-six percent are moderately confident and an equal share of Americans aren't very confident or are not at all so.



The poll shows the public relatively unsympathetic to those leaking information about the investigation. Fifty-four percent say they're doing more harm than good by potentially damaging national security. Forty-two percent think they're doing more good by giving the public necessary information.



The AP-NORC poll of 1,068 adults was conducted June 8-11 using a sample drawn from NORC's probability-based AmeriSpeak panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 4.1 percentage points.



Respondents were first selected randomly using address-based sampling methods, and later interviewed online or by phone.