FBI Director James B. Comey sent an ominously worded but content-free letter to members of Congress on Friday apprising them that additional...
FBI Director James B. Comey sent an ominously worded but content-free letter to members of Congress on Friday apprising them that additional emails had been found that “appear to be pertinent” to the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s email server. But wait: The FBI didn’t know what is in the emails. (A warrant to review their contents was reportedly obtained on Sunday.) One has to question then how he even knew they were pertinent to Clinton, let alone significant. They could all be duplicates of things we have seen. (Other reports suggest none of them came from her server.) After a weekend of FBI and Justice Department officials struggling via background leaks to make sense of the letter, we are no closer to figuring out why Comey chose to make such a big splash with so little information.
Pete Williams reported that Justice Department officials “cited long-standing policies against disclosing details of investigations that are underway or taking actions that could affect an election, especially in the period leading up to one.” He continued, “That was especially so, they said, given that FBI agents have not yet analyzed the newly discovered e-mails to see if they contain classified information, the central issue in the investigation of the Clinton private e-mail server.”
Comey defenders say that he was between the proverbial rock and a hard place. If it came out after the election that these emails were relevant he would have been accused of hiding the ball. That’s not a rock and a hard place — it’s Comey trying to protect himself from second guessing.
Eric Holder: James Comey is a good man, but he made a serious mistake
If he had not sent the letter and was asked after the election why the potential for more information was not disclosed, he would/should have answered as follows:
I literally had no idea what was in the emails. It therefore would have been impossible to determine if they were significant — or even related to Hillary Clinton at all. We did not even have a warrant until Oct. 30. We do not make announcements about the potential for discovery of more information that might or might not have relevance to a past investigation. There is a reason why the FBI does not comment on ongoing investigations. It is why the Justice Department does not even bring indictments before an election; indictments contain allegations but these are not proven. And here we didn’t have enough even to make an allegation. It would therefore be prejudicial and highly unfair to put that out, especially less than two weeks before an election.
Comey did not do that because, according to news reports, he’s been smarting under brutal fire from Republicans since deciding not to recommend a prosecution back in July. Well, to that we say: Tough. It’s not his job to try to silence outrage. It’s certainly not his job to do a “make good” for one side by overcompensating in its direction when a new issue comes up. That’s politics, not justice.
