James Comey | |||
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7th Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation From: September 4, 2013 – May 9, 2017 | |||
Predecessor | Robert S. Mueller | ||
Successor | Andrew McCabe (acting) | ||
Deputy Attorney General From: December 9, 2003, to August 15, 2005 | |||
Predecessor | Larry Thompson | ||
Successor | Paul McNulty | ||
Information |
James Brien "Jimmy the Weasel" Comey Jr. (December 14, 1960) is the disgraced chief law enforcement officer and Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) appointed by President Barack Obama on September 4, 2013, and a lawyer. In addition to being suspected of obstruction of justice in whitewashing the Hillary Clinton email scandal,[1][2][3] Comey attempted to blackmail President-elect Trump with false insinuations of bizarre sexual improprieties, and was later fired for incompetence, running a culture of leaks and bribery within the FBI, and destroying the morale of FBI employees
Immediately after being fired, Comey leaked classified memos that he wrote to the fake news media, which generated hysteria in the liberal media calling for the appointment of Special Counsel Robert Mueller to investigate if President Trump was an agent of the Russian Federation. He was thoroughly discredited, rebuked, and ostracized in two separate inspector general reports.
As Director, Comey colluded with the Clinton campaign and Russia to smear Donald Trump and associates through an organization known as FusionGPS.[4] After a 17-month review of peculiarities in the Clinton email investigation and 2016 election, Inspector General Michael Horowitz found Comey's decisions"negatively impacted the perception of the FBI and the Department as fair administrators of justice." |
In April 2018 Comey was referred to the Justice Department for criminal investigation and prosecution.[5]
Comey is considered by many as the most corrupt FBI Director since J. Edgar Hoover.[6] The FISA courts were established after Hoover's death to bring judicial oversight to the FBI and limit abuse.[7] Under James Comey,[8] the FBI circumvented the FISA court,[9] and engaged in domestic political spying and election interference.[10] His book, A Higher Loyalty, is an ode to Marxism-Leninism over American democracy.
Between December 9, 2003, and August 15, 2005, he served as United States Deputy Attorney General under the administration of President George W. Bush.
Comey infiltrated the Republican Party and later became an independent. Comey told NYMag "In college, I was left of center, and through a gradual process I found myself more comfortable with a lot of the ideas and approaches the Republicans were using.” He voted for Carter in 1980, but in ’84, “I voted for Reagan—I’d moved from Communist to whatever I am now. I’m not even sure how to characterize myself politically. Maybe at some point, I’ll have to figure it out.”[11]
His wife and daughters attended the left-wing, anti-Trump Women's March and supported Hillary Clinton.[12] Comey built his career and reputation among leftists prosecuting the cases of Martha Stewart, Steven Hatfield (the Anthrax case), Scooter Libby, and Dinesh D'Souza. After his firing Comey, among other examples, illustrated his left-wing leanings by advocating for gun control and calling for Democrats to take control of Congress.[13]
Comey earned the moniker "Jimmy the Weasel" after privately assuring President Trump "I don't leak. I don't do weasel moves," which he promptly leaked to the New York Times.[14][15]
On July 14, 2003, the Washington Post identified a CIA agent, Valerie Plame, sourced to unnamed senior Bush administration officials. Allegations were made that Karl Rove, then-President George W. Bush's senior political advisor, leaked the information. Comey raised concern about the appearance of a conflict of interest between Rove and then-Attorney General John Ashcroft because Rove had managed one of Ashcroft's Senate campaigns. On December 30, 2003, then-Attorney General Ashcroft recused himself from the investigation.
Comey became the Acting Attorney General for purposes of the investigation and appointed a Special Prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald, to harass President Bush's chief re-election strategist, Karl Rove.
Fitzgerald framed Dick Cheney's Chief of staff Scooter Libby on bogus charges. Fitzgerald never did find or solve the real leaker in the case, but managed to bankrupt and destroy the lives of innocent people serving President Bush and tarnish a Republican administration's reputation - which was the real purpose of the investigation. Fitzgerald became Comey's criminal defense lawyer in 2017.
Comey later told Sally Yates of the similarities between the Plame leak case and the Hillary Clinton email investigation: namely, that in the Plame case there was no basis to prosecute Rove, and he did not think the Bush Administration could have announced a decision to decline prosecution in a way that assured the public the investigation was done objectively.
As in the Trump-Russia scam, the Attorney General was first neutralized with a conflict of interest by fake news reporting from the Washington Post, impugning innocent people. Followed by a public clamouring to initiate a Special Counsel fishing expedition. Then a partisan deputy assuming the reins appoints a special counsel to harass a Republican administration. Comey is a major player in engineering the same scenario in both the Valerie Plame and Trump-Russia witchhunts.
He served on the Board of Directors of HSBC Holdings until July 2013.[16] In 2012, HSBC was the subject of hearings of the U.S. Senate permanent subcommittee for its money laundering activities. On 16 July the committee presented its findings.[17][18][19] Among other things, it concluded that HSBC had been transferring $7 billion in banknotes from its Mexican to its US subsidiary, much of it related to drug trafficing[20]), was disregarding terrorist financing links and was actively circumventing US safeguards to block transactions involving terrorists, drug lords and rogue regimes, including hiding $19.4 billion in transactions with Iran. This investigation followed on from a probe by the US Federal Reserve and Office of the Comptroller of the Currency found that there was "significant potential for unreported money laundering or terrorist financing".[21] On 11 December 2012, HSBC agreed to pay a record $1.92 billion fine in this money laundering case. "Bank officials repeatedly ignored internal warnings that HSBC's monitoring systems were inadequate, the Justice DHe served on the Board of Directors of HSBC Holdings until July 2013.[22] In 2012, HSBC was the subject of hearings of the U.S. Senate permanent subcommittee for its money laundering activities. On 16 July the committee presented its findings.epartment said. In 2008, for example, the CEO of HSBC Mexico was told that Mexican law enforcement had a recording of a Mexican drug lord saying that HSBC Mexico was the place to launder money."[23] The United States Department of Justice, however, decided not to pursue criminal penalties, a decision which the New York Times labelled a "dark day for the rule of law."[24]
During the presidential elections in 2016, Comey investigated the Hillary Clinton email scandal, which has been seen as a main factor of her loss. Despite damning evidence and in violation of departmental rules, Comey publicly stated the FBI could find no cause to recommend prosecution only to be forced to re-open the case days before the election. Clinton blamed Comey for her failed campaign.[25]
President Obama exchanged emails with Secretary Clinton and knew of her use of an illegal server prior to the time he said he learned of it.[26] In early May 2016 Comey emailed his draft statement exonerating Secretary Clinton to FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, FBI General Counsel James Baker, and FBI Chief of Staff James Rybicki, even though only one year prior Bryan Nishimura was charged for a nearly identical situation. The reference to communicating with "the President" in the revised draft was changed to “another senior government official". However, in Comey's final public statement, even the reference to “another senior government official” was blotted out as too incriminating, and stricken altogether. Section 793(f) of the Espionage Act prohibits having knowledge, and failing to report, the existence of national defense documents that are mishandled through gross negligence.[27] Comey never made a truthful and accurate report to Congress about his findings. Gross negligence in handling classified information is a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
Comey met with President Obama on the morning of May 16, 2016;[28] by afternoon his revised draft was circulating among McCabe, Baker, Rybicki, Peter Strzok, Bill Priestap, Trisha Anderson, Johnathan Moffa, David Bowdich and others.[29][30] Obama intervened in the investigation when he publicly stated that Hillary Clinton showed “carelessness” in using a private e-mail server.[31][32] Strzok struck Comey's original finding, "grossly negligent", and inserted Obama's "extremely careless."
Comey never investigated Hillary's willful destruction of documents. Comey later admitted the investigation was driven by politics, and not the law, a desire to clear Hillary Clinton so she could win the Democratic nomination for president.
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein wrote in a performance review of Comey's behavior,
"The director was wrong to usurp the Attorney General's authority on July 5, 2016, and announce his conclusion that the case should be closed without prosecution.It is not the function of the Director to make such an announcement. At most, the Director should have said the FBI had completed its investigation and presented its findings to federal prosecutors. The Director now defends his decision by asserting that he believed attorney General Loretta Lynch had a conflict. But the FBI Director is never empowered to supplant federal prosecutors and assume command of the Justice Department. There is a well-established process for other officials to step in when a conflict requires the recusal of the Attorney General. On July 5, however, the Director announced his own conclusions about the nation's most sensitive criminal investigation, without the authorization of duly appointed Justice Department leaders.
Compounding the error, the Director ignored another longstanding principle: we do not hold press conferences to release derogatory information about the subject of a declined criminal investigation. Derogatory information sometimes is disclosed in the course of criminal investigations and prosecutions, but we never release it gratuitously. The Director laid out his version of the facts for the news media as if it were a closing argument, but without a trial. It is a textbook example of what federal prosecutors and agents are taught not to do.
In response to skeptical question at a congressional hearing, the Director defended his remarks by saying that his "goal was to say what is true. What did we do, what did we find, what do we think about it." But the goal of a federal criminal investigation is not to announce our thoughts at a press conference. The goal is to determine whether there is sufficient evidence to justify a federal criminal prosecution, then allow a federal prosecutor who exercises authority delegated by the Attorney General to make a prosecutorial decision, and then - if prosecution is warranted - let the judge and jury determine the facts. We sometimes release information about closed investigations in appropriate ways, but the FBI does not do it sua sponte."[33]
Comey testified his decision not to recommend prosecution of Hillary Clinton came after her July 2, 2016 interview with FBI investigators Peter Strzok and David Laufman. FBI Documents reveal Comey decided more than six weeks earlier before the investigation was completed.[34][35][36][37]
Mr. RATCLIFFE. ...If there was ever any possibility that something Hillary Clinton might have said on July 2 could have possibly resulted in criminal charges that might possibly have resulted in a trial against her relating to this classified information, well, then, to use your words, Director, I don’t think that there is any reasonable prosecutor out there who would have allowed two immunized witnesses central to the prosecution proving the case against her to sit in the room with the interview, the FBI interview, of the subject of that investigation.
And if I heard you earlier today, in your long career, I heard you say that you have never had that circumstance. Is that—did I hear you correctly?
Mr. COMEY. That is correct, but——
Mr. RATCLIFFE. Okay. And I never have either, and I have never met a prosecutor that has ever had that.
So, to me, the only way that an interview takes place with the two central witnesses and the subject of the investigation is if the decision has already been made that all three people in that room are not going to be charged.
Mr. COMEY. Can I respond?
Mr. RATCLIFFE. Yes. Please.
Mr. COMEY. I know in our political lives sometimes people casually accuse each other of being dishonest, but if colleagues of ours believe I am lying about when I made this decision, please urge them to contact me privately so we can have a conversation about this.
All I can do is to tell you again, the decision was made after that, because I didn’t know what was going to happen in that interview...[38]
Comey faces charges of violating 18 USC 1621 and 18 USC 1001.
On October 28, ten days before the 2016 presidential election, Comey was forced to go public with re-opening the Clinton email investigation when the New York Police Department (NYPD) planned a press conference about evidence they seized on Anthony Weiner's laptop computer.[39] 650,000 classified State Department emails and other damning evidence was found.[40]
Re-opening Hillary's email case threw the Clinton campaign and poll numbers into a tailspin.[41] Comey later explainedhe felt obligated to take more of a personal role as the public face of the investigation rather than deferring to then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch – in part because of something involving Lynch that he cryptically refers to as a “development still unknown to the American public to this day.”[42]The Weiner/Abedin/Clinton laptop evidence was turned over by NYPD to the DOJ Southern District of New York (SDNY). Previously a grand jury in New York refused to return an indictment against the NY police in the Eric Garner case.[43] Garner was killed in police custody while put in a chokehold. As an outcome of that grand jury finding, and of their own investigation, the Eastern District of New York (EDNY) was not pursuing criminal charges against NYPD officers involved. Federal prosecutors in the Washington D.C. DOJ Civil Rights Division argued there was clear evidence to bring charges,[44] whereas FBI officials and the DOJ EDNY opposed bringing any charges.
Loretta Lynch threatened to take the Garner case away from the Brooklyn Eastern District of New York (EDNY) and give it to Preet Bharara of the Manhattan South District of New York (SDNY) if the NYPD went public with the evidence they found on the Weiner laptop.[45] Lynch used the Justice Department to threaten NYPD into sitting on its evidence in the Weiner case to protect Hillary Clinton.[46][47]
Comey admitted under oath that the FBI had never investigated the false claim made by CrowdStrike that Russians had hacked the DNC servers.
The law requires the FBI Director to notify the Gang of Eight Congressional leaders of any surveillance of American citizens authorised by the FISA court every 90 days. In addition to hoaxing the FISA court into granting a FISA warrant on Trump associates with false evidence manufactured by Hillary Clinton and the Democrats, Comey never fulfilled his legal obligation to apprise Congressional leaders of both parties about the FBI's clandestine activities.
In a meeting during Trump's transition, Comey asked others present to leave the room so he could present the Democrat opposition research to Trump as a US "intelligence product" in an effort to blackmail Trump. In sordid Congressional testimony after his firing, Comey claimed he thought it was unusual or improper weeks later when Trump asked him for a one-on-one meeting.
After whitewashing Hillary Clinton's widely known criminality so she could secure the Democratic nomination against Bernie Sanders, Comey refused to lift the cloud of innuendo over President Trump generated by the collusion between Democrat opposition researchers and the FBI, despite pleas from Congress and Comey's own private admissions that Trump was not under criminal investigation.
President Obama began the conversation by stressing his continued commitment to ensuring that every aspect of this issue is handled by the intelligence and law enforcement communities "by the book". The President stressed that he is not asking about, initiating or instructing anything from a law enforcement perspective. He reiterated that our law enforcement team needs to proceed as it normally would by the book.At the conclusion of the briefing, Obama held Sally Yates and Comey aside. The 90-day surveillance period under the secret FISA warrant had just over two weeks remaining — it was set to expire just as Trump was taking office. The Obama administration was facing a deadline if the secret FISA warrant was to be renewed before Obama left office. They needed to figure out how the investigation could continue as Trump was sworn in as president. Rice's “by the book” comment is transparent: Obama claimed to adhere to a book that forbade consultations between political officials and civil service investigators. But here they were consulting. So Rice tried to cover their tracks in her CYA email: She revises history such that the consultation morphs into a mere friendly reminder that Obama wanted everything done by the book.[53]
From a national security perspective, however, President Obama said he wants to be sure that, as we engage with the incoming team, we are mindful to ascertain if there is any reason that we cannot share information fully as it relates to Russia.
[Redacted section]
The President asked Comey to inform him if anything changes in the next few weeks that should affect how we share classified information with the incoming team. Comey said he would."[52]
The next morning CIA Director Brennan released an unclassified version of the Joint Analysis Report, a joint Comey, Clapper and Brennan document consisting of recycled reports on Russia Today (RT) with 2 pages of sexual innuendo from the Clinton-Steele dossier. NSA Dir. Adm. Mike Rogers dissented from the report.[54] The Washington Post was assured that "the sources involved in the [Clinton-Steele dossier's] reporting were credible enough to warrant inclusion in the highly classified [presidential] report.”[55] Brennan however in later public testimony said the dossier and its sources were not credible enough to incorporate in the Joint Analysis Report on Russian election interference. Brennan swore the Clinton-Steele dossier did not “in any way” factor into the CIA's assessment that Russia interfered in the election to help Trump. The classified version of Comey, Clapper and Brennan's Joint Analysis Report congressional investigators found contradicts Brennan's sworn testimony.
The same day the Intelligence Community Assessment was released, Comey, Clapper, Brennan, and Adm. Rogers traveled to New York to brief President-elect Trump on the report. Comey asked for a one-on-one briefing with Trump at the end of the meeting. Without informing Trump of the true origins which Comey knew was Democrat and Clinton opposition talking points, Comey represented the "salacious" allegations to Trump as some sort of official US government intelligence report. It fundamentally was an effort by Comey to blackmail the new president, as J. Edgar Hoover had done with seven president's that Hoover served under over 47-years, which is why Congress limited the term of future directors and created judicial oversight of the FBI by the FISA court. But Comey and other Obama progressives had already figured a way to circumvent and hoax the FISA court.[60]
In his Congressional testimony Comey swore the dossier was "salacious and unverifed" although the FBI/DOJ used it to obtain FISA surveillance warrants on the Trump campaign in October 2016.
The Obama administration for the first time since the Watergate reforms of the 1970s successfully carried out what Richard Nixon attempted but failed to do - use the FBI and CIA to spy on, harass, and violate the civil rights of domestic political opponents. Comey did not inform Trump of the FISA surveillance on the Trump campaign and transition team - Carter Page, Paul Manafort, Michael Cohen, Mike Flynn and others. Comey only spoke of the manufactured sexual innuendo by Hillary Clinton's hirelings. According to Comey, he acted on the instructions of Brennan and Clapper, [61] and not President Obama after the day prior Oval Office meeting.[62] "[T]he leaders of the intelligence community agreed [Trump] needed to be told about because we knew it and thought it was about to become public."[63]
Comey's testimony to Department of Justice (DOJ) Inspector Michael Horowitz directly contradicts what he had sworn to Congress about his January 6, 2017 briefing of President-elect Trump. Comey had testified to Congress that he was briefingPresident-elect Trump on the "salacious and unverified" Steele dossier "because we had been told by the media it was about to launch. We didn’t want to be keeping that from him. He needed to know this was being said. I was very keen not to leave him with an impression that the bureau was trying to do something to him.” Comey told the inspector general however that the information he obtained from his conversation with Trump “ought to be treated…[like] FISA derived information or information in a [counterintelligence] investigation.” [64][65]
Comey conspired with Brennan, Clapper, and Obama to publicly embarrass the incoming president with false information. The IC label as the source of the information in news reports gave the false information credibility in the eyes of the public.
On January 10, 2017 Obama DNI Clapper leaked to Jake Tapper the briefing on the Clinton campaign's allegations that Trump consorted with prostitutes in a Moscow hotel, creating the "news hook" CNN was looking for to justify reporting details.[67] An hour later CNN linked to BuzzFeed making the Clinton-Steele dossier public.[68] The Clinton opposition research was broadcast to the public as some sort of official "intelligence report" with mysterious origins that the Obama administration was acting on. Simultaneously Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta was meeting secretly with FusionGPS boss Glenn Simpson. FusionGPS was paid $1,024,408 to create the false allegations.[69] Trump responded "I win an election easily, a great "movement" is verified, and crooked opponents try to belittle our victory with FAKE NEWS. A sorry state! ... Intelligence agencies should never have allowed this fake news to ‘leak’ into the public. One last shot at me. Are we living in Nazi Germany?”[70] Trump stated that he was not briefed on the full contents the Clinton-Steele dossier or its origins. NBC News independently verified Trump's account,[71] as did FOX News.[72] Clapper issued a press release moments later stating that he only now, that evening, not four days earlier on January 6, discussed the Clinton-Steele dossier with Trump.[73]
Jake Tapper reported that government sources confirmed it was the wrong "Michael Cohen" who allegedly travelled to Prague to pay the KGB to hack into the DNC as the Democrat talking points contend, further debunking the Steele dossier.[74]
On January 13 Chuck Ross of the Daily Caller identified the group Hillary Clinton hired - FusionGPS, Christopher Steele's employer, and Glenn Simpson its founder - as the same group that colluded with Russia during the 2016 campaign to repeal Russian sanctions, the Magnitsky Act.[75][76] Ross stated that part of Simpson's work involved passing stories to his deep network of journalism contacts in order to undermine the law.
"Someone at the highest levels of government has leaked information to the news media about President Trump's discussions with Russian officials...candidate Donald Trump indeed insulted the intelligence community during the election, and many have concluded that this is their plotted revenge...we have some very powerful people in Washington who really don't like how democracy played out this time around and what they do to attack it next isn't going to be any better than what they're doing now."[83] |
On June 8 in sworn testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee, Comey admitted to wrongdoing in leaking information relevant to an FBI investigation to the media.[84] Comey claimed he was motivated by Trump tweets, although the first leak was published on May 11, 2017 before Trump tweeted, raising yet again another instance where Comey may have misled Congress in his sworn testimony.
Deep State informant Eric Ciaramella worked with Democratic National Committee operative Alexandra Chalupa to dig up dirt on the Trump campaign during the 2016 presidential election. Ciaramella was detailed to the White House by Russia collusion hoax mastermind John Brennan in the Summer of 2016. In May 2017, Ciaramella was instrumental in helping generate the “Putin fired Comey” narrative. A Ciaramella email the day after Comey's firing ended up in the media, which is reported to have allegedly called Comey “crazy, a real nut job.”
Ciaramella is said to have argued that “President Putin suggested that President Trump fire Comey.” In the days after Comey's firing, this presidential action was used to further political and media calls for the appointment of a special counsel to investigate supposed ‘Russia collusion.’[85]
As a result of DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz's review, a referral from Congress, and the appointment of federal prosecutor John Huber, Barack Obama's choice to lead the nation's premier law enforcement agency, is now facing criminal prosecution.
Comey faces charges for:
Comey clearly departed from FBI and Department norms, and his decisions negatively impacted the perception of the FBI and the Department as fair administrators of justice.Despite being blamed by Hillary for the election of Trump, Comey has become a celebrity in liberal circles for vicious attacks on Trump from the former alleged non-partisan civil servant. In a series of book promos assisted by George Stephanopoulos and ABC News, Comey said,
"the president of the United States is accusing people of crimes without evidence and pronouncing them guilty and saying they should be in jail. That should wake all of us up."[87]Yet Comey refused to state publicly that President Trump was not under FBI criminal investigation, despite saying so privately, and the injunction of Congressional leaders to say so publicly.[88] It was the smears of Clinton's opposition research dressed up as intelligence reports, Obama administration leaks, and Comey himself working with FusionGPS,[89] that left hanging a cloud of innuendo upon President Trump which Comey knew to be false. Additionally, Comey apologist George Stephanopoulos was White House Communications Director under Bill Clinton, coordinating media attacks on "bimbos" and "nuts and sluts" to cover-up sexual assaults Bill Clinton had been accused of.
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