President Donald Trump said there was no doubt what former FBI Director James Comey was implying when he posted a beach photo showing seashells arranged with the message “86 47.″

“He knew exactly what he meant, a child knows what that meant … that meant assassination,“ Trump told Fox News’ Bret Baier during an interview on ”Special Report” set to air Friday night. “And it says it loud and clear.”

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Thursday that federal law enforcement is investigating the since-deleted social media post in which Comey wrote “cool shell formation on my beach walk” under a picture of seashells that appeared to form the shapes for “86 47.”

Merriam-Webster, the dictionary used by The Associated Press, says 86 is slang meaning “to throw out,” “to get rid of” or “to refuse service to.” It notes: “Among the most recent senses adopted is a logical extension of the previous ones, with the meaning of ‘to kill.’ We do not enter this sense, due to its relative recency and sparseness of use.”

Comey, a Republican and career public prosecutor, was appointed to his post by then-President Barack Obama to a seven-year term as FBI director in 2013.

He was fired by Trump during the president’s first term amid the bureau’s probe into allegations of ties between Russian officials and Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign. Comey wrote about his career in the best-selling memoir “A Higher Loyalty.”

Trump told Baier that Comey was incompetent.

“Now, he wasn’t very competent but he was competent enough to know what that meant. And he did it [posted the photo] for a reason, and he was hit so hard because people like me and they like what’s happening to our country … He’s calling for the assassination of the president.”

Comey apologized and took down his Instagram post.

“I posted earlier a picture of some shells I saw today on a beach walk, which I assumed were a political message,” the former FBI director posted.

“I didn’t realize some folks associated those numbers with violence,” he continued. “It never occurred to me but I oppose violence of any kind so I took the post down.”

Trump claimed Comey’s mea culpa was insincere.

“Well, he apologized because he was hit,” he told Baier.

Don’t want to take a position because “it’ll be up to Pam”

“I think it’s a terrible thing, and when you add his history to that, if he had a clean history – he doesn’t, he’s a dirty cop …

The Associated Press contributed to this report.