Althouse: "Former FBI Director James Comey violated FBI policies in his handling of memos documenting private conversations with President Donald Trump..."

August 29, 2019

"Former FBI Director James Comey violated FBI policies in his handling of memos documenting private conversations with President Donald Trump..."

"... the Justice Department’s inspector general said Thursday. The watchdog office said Comey broke bureau rules by giving one memo containing unclassified information to a friend with instructions to share the contents with a reporter. Comey also failed to notify the FBI after he was dismissed in May 2017 that he had retained some of the memos in a safe at home, the report said. 'By not safeguarding sensitive information obtained during the course of his FBI employment, and by using it to create public pressure for official action, Comey set a dangerous example for the over 35,000 current FBI employees — and the many thousands more former FBI employees — who similarly have access to or knowledge of non-public information,' the report says.... Comey said he considered his memos to be personal rather than government documents, and it never would’ve occurred to him to give them back to the FBI after he was fired. The inspector general’s office disagreed, citing policy that FBI employees must give up all documents with FBI information once they leave the bureau."

AP reports.

209 comments:

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Bruce Hayden said...: New page?; 8/30/19, 2:13 PM
Bruce Hayden said...: “New page?“

Bingo!!!; 8/30/19, 2:14 PM
TJM said...: Without charges and convictions, the government might as well shut down the DOJ and FBI as being worthless. Needless to say, the national media must be destroyed because it functions as a SuperPac for the Demtards; 8/30/19, 2:58 PM
gadfly said...: Trump repeatedly pressured Comey to end a criminal investigation into his current (and then former) National Security Advisor who was at the center of that Russia/campaign story. Indeed, Trump took any number of steps to block active investigations into what had happened during the 2016 election. Having failed to end the investigation, Trump then fired Comey with a series of bogus and later discredited cover stories. The day after Comey’s firing, Trump hosted the Russian Ambassador and Foreign Minister in the Oval Office, bragged about firing Comey and revealed to them some of the most classified intelligence the U.S. has about intelligence collected in Syria.

[. . . ]

The [Horowitz] report confirms the legally significant point: he broke no laws. But of course Comey was not simply within his rights but had an affirmative obligation to bring this information to light. Critically, he had no reason to believe that the others in the existing chain of command weren’t compromised by Trump’s corruption and efforts to end the investigation. Indeed, what we have subsequently learned gives every reason to believe they were compromised. The only reason this isn’t obvious is that we’ve had Trump’s denials, lying and gaslighting in our collective heads for the last two plus years.

Of course Comey had to bring this critical information to light. In every substantive sense, he was acting as a whistleblower in what amounted to a national emergency. Only collective amnesia and denial can suggest otherwise.; 8/30/19, 3:57 PM
Bruce Hayden said...: @Gadfly.

Sorry. Total BS.

The investigation into Flynn was never legitimate. His original “sin” was talking to the Russian ambassador during the Transition. They alleged it was a Logan Act violation. A statute that is over two hundred years old, with two cases filed, both over two centuries ago, with no convictions. Plus it very clearly violates the 1st Amdt. Every NSA in an incoming Administration does exactly the same thing - starts building rapport with his counterparts, so that when the new President takes office, it can hit the ground running. Let me repeat that - Gen Flynn did nothing wrong or illegal talking to the Russian Ambassador during the Transition. He was expected to. It was his job.

Then, right after Trump was inaugurated, Comey’s #2, DDir McCabe, got NSA Flynn on the phone, at the WH, asked if a couple agents of his could drop by for an informal talk. McCabe told Flynn that he didn’t need an attorney present. When the agents (including the ubiquitous Peter Strzok) arrived, they continued to pretend that it was an informal talk, didn’t inform Flynn that anything he said might be used against him, nor that he might want to have an attorney present. They then proceeded to quiz him on his phone call with the Russian Ambassador, which they had a (probably illegal) transcript for, and he didn’t. Not surprisingly, given how hectic the transition and first days of the Administration, he might have gotten some specifics wrong. Might have. We will never know, of course, because instead of recording the conversation, the two agents (including Strzok) recorded their impressions of what he said on 302 forms. Then, weeks later DDir McCabe, Comey’s #2, revised the forms multiple times, before they were ever filed formally, many weeks later than FBI rules require.

It was a perjury trap, plain and simple, run by Comey’s #2, DDir McCabe, and his most loyal henchmen. It would never fly in court, knowing what we know now. The 302s would, of course, be inadmissible as hearsay. And all the judge would have to show that Flynn had “lied” was the testimony of the two, now discredited, FBI agents, since they still haven’t supplied the judge with the unredacted transcript of the conversation that they claim he lied about. The prosecution (under Mueller) failed to supply the defense with all of the various copies of the 302s, despite this judge’s standing orders to provide ALL exonerating or potentially exonerating evidence (a practice started when he caught the very same prosecutors not turning over exonerating evidence in a previous big case in front of him). And of course, DDir McCabe’s advisement not to have attorneys present alone would normally get the case tossed. Despite Gen Flynn’s admission of guilt over two years ago (to protect his son), the judge has still not sentenced him.

Your theory seems to be that Comey could claim a higher calling, in lying to his boss, the President, because his immediate subordinate, McCabe, had run a perjury trap on the NSA in his WH office. Doesn’t work that way. Comey was McCabe’s immediate supervisor. Comey doesn’t get to play the innocent here, esp since it was McCabe’s people following his direct orders, who pulled it off. Comey had responsibility esp for what his #2 did. It was his FBI that executed the perjury trap. His people. He can’t then claim that as a reason to justify lying to the President.; 8/30/19, 5:53 PM
Bruce Hayden said...: Let me also point out the obvious by now. Comey’s #2, DDir McCabe, along with his loyal henchmen, including Strzok and Page, knew by the time Trump was inaugurated, and NSA Flynn was caught in McCabe’s perjury trap, with a certainty, that there never had been any credible evidence of collusion between Trump, his immediate subordinates(including Flynn) and the Russians. That is because the entire conspiracy that was finally fully discredited this spring with the Mueller Report, was organized around McCabe’s $70k conference room table. Page was his personal attorney, and was involved in a love affair with Strzok, whose fingers were absolutely everywhere on the hoax. ADAG Ohr came directly to McCabe to set up Steele’s backdoor to the FBI, and and Ohr has testified, under oath, that He warned McCabe and Strzok that the Steele Dossier was uncorroborated, and very iffy. Which means that Comey had constructive knowledge of al this at the time he was lying to the President.; 8/30/19, 5:53 PM
Gk1 said...: I remember Trey Gowdy over a year and 1/2 ago had posited that either this was a soft coup by a confederation of Obama players or our intelligence agencies are filled with complete incompetents who really believed Steele's pee report. I am not sure what is more unsettling at this point.; 8/30/19, 7:58 PM
Bruce Hayden said...: “I remember Trey Gowdy over a year and 1/2 ago had posited that either this was a soft coup by a confederation of Obama players or our intelligence agencies are filled with complete incompetents who really believed Steele's pee report. I am not sure what is more unsettling at this point.”

My theory is that it is both. McCade, Yates, Strzok, Page, Brennan, Clapper, etc were likely involved in a soft coup. Comey and maybe Mueller were their somewhat innocent dupes.; 8/30/19, 8:25 PM
Gk1 said...: God help us all. These are the same folks supposedly keeping the world at bay and they couldn't empty a boot full of piss if the instructions were printed on the heel.; 8/30/19, 8:39 PM