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| FBI Director James Comey, testifying Monday, March 20, 2017, before the House intelligence committee, said the agency opened an investigation last July into possible ties between Russia and U.S. President Donald Trump's campaign. (Manuel Balce Ceneta/Associated Press) |
Quick — name the 2016 presidential candidate who was subjected for months to an FBI investigation during last year's U.S. election.
If you answered Hillary Clinton, you'd only be half-right.
As revealed during Monday's House intelligence committee hearing on Russian meddling during the U.S. election, it turns out President Donald Trump was also being scrutinized.
FBI Director James Comey disclosed that the Republican president's campaign was under investigation since July.
The U.S. intelligence service was evidently looking for proof of the Trump team's alleged ties to Russia, an investigation that started four months before the election and remains active.
But while Comey kept the Trump-Russia probe under wraps until now, his disclosure last year about the FBI's investigation into Clinton's email habits dogged her throughout her campaign.
A pivotal declaration came just 10 days before election day, when Comey announced that emails that might be "pertinent" to the investigation were discovered on electronic devices belonging to Anthony Weiner, the estranged husband of Clinton confidante Huma Abedin.
'Vast double standard'
That so much focus was put on Clinton's emails while an FBI Trump investigation was simultaneously being kept secret has outraged some of Clinton's supporters. It has also revived allegations that Comey, a Republican, is acting out of politically motivated bias.Former Clinton staffer Philippe Reines wrote on Twitter Monday that while the FBI in July 2016 had apparently opened an investigation into Trump but released "nothing public," Comey was wrapping a probe on Clinton's emails and disparaging her that very month.
"Annoying," Reines wrote.
Adam Serwer, a senior editor with The Atlantic, tweeted that it was "fascinating" that Comey "only disclosed that one of the two candidates" was under investigation.
"[Comey] spilled the beans on Huma's laptop, but not this?" asked political historian Michael Cohen, author of American Maelstrom.
Speaking from New York, Clinton loyalist Amy Siskind found Comey's disclosure to be "a vast double standard" about how the FBI treats classified information.
Some of Hillary Clinton's supporters are outraged that so much focus was put on her emails while an FBI Trump investigation was simultaneously being kept secret. (J. Scott Applewhite/Associated Press)
Comey's last-minute letter about emails was especially galling for Siskind, "versus saying nothing about ... an ongoing investigation on the Trump team," she said.
'No rhyme or reason'
Former intelligence officials were perplexed. Why divulge information about one FBI investigation during the campaign but not the other?"There really is no rhyme or reason for why he talks publicly about some investigations and not others," said Chris Swecker, a former FBI assistant director who has worked with Comey. "The golden rule is you just don't talk about ongoing investigations at all."
A difference in Comey's mind was likely that Clinton's emails were now a matter of public record, said Gary Schmitt, co-director of the Marilyn Ware Center for Security Studies at the American Enterprise Institute.
"It would have been very strange for the bureau to deny an investigation was going on from the Clinton emails when there was all the slop on the table."
The investigation into Trump and his team's possible links to the Russian state, on the other hand, would likely have involved intelligence sourcing of confidential information, "which you would want to keep secret until sufficient facts have been gathered to either indict or not."
Like Swecker, John McLaughlin, a former deputy director of the CIA, rejects the premise that the current director would be compromised politically.
"It's easy to criticize him for what happened, but the truth is, he should never have been asked to take responsibility for the investigation," McLaughlin said.
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| FBI director James Comey in congressional hot seat |
The July timeline about the Trump-Russia probe was no less startling, though one Democratic legislator who may have already known was Harry Reid.
The Nevada Democrat's words, penned in a blistering letter to Comey dated Oct. 30, may resonate even more now with a segment of voters who believe outside forces — whether from Russian meddling or FBI favouritism — tipped the outcome in Trump's favour.
"Your highly selective approach to publicizing information, along with your timing, was intended for the success or failure of a partisan candidate or political group," Reid wrote at the time.
He urged Comey in the letter to release what he called "explosive information about close ties and co-ordination" between Trump's advisers and the Kremlin.
No timeline is set for when the Trump-Russia probe will conclude. Until that time, legislators on Monday asked Comey whether he anticipated escalation. The FBI director is bracing for another dose of attempted Russian meddling in the U.S. electoral system in 2018 or 2020.
The Russians have now successfully "introduced chaos and division and discord," he conceded.
"We have to assume they're coming back."
-By Matt Kwong
My take:
If it is true that an FBI director is concerned about the political aspect of the investigations relative to the election and knows he is pushing the envelope with respect to publicizing Clinton's investigation and not Trump's last summer through the election then the last thing in the world, the very one thing he doesn't even want to come close to doing is going public just 10 days before the election publicizing something regarding the already public investigation of Clinton that did not need to be publicized and was unnecessary as opposed to the not publicized investigation into her opponent.
You can argue there is no politicizing about publicizing one and not the other early on but the occurrence of the latter 10 days before the election sinks any claims to non-partisanship.
The FBI director testified before congress that he had two choices; conceal or speak but that is not the honest characterization. The two choices were; adhere to long held FBI protocol of not interfering in elections or influence the election. He chose the latter but he had good reason not to and adhere to FBI protocol.
They did not know if they had incriminating evidence and they did not. Unless they wanted to influence the election the right choice is to state that they did not have time to determine whether the evidence was incriminating and so were compelled to wait until after the election. The timing of this says it all.
So there clearly is strong weight for the claim that the FBI director moved to influence the election just 10 days before the election and that lends credence to the accusation of politicizing regarding the publicizing of one and not the other beginning last summer. The election seriously appears to have been thrown by an arm of the government and it is believable because that arm of the government is heavily weighted to the side of favoring policy positions of the Republican party.
Funny how the Republicans can hardly win an election without meddling with it or discouraging voters from voting or gerrymandering or SCOTUS help. The GOP clearly needs a fix to win and with their biggest fix of all, the SCOTUS gift of Citizens United(Ripped Off) pouring unlimited money into congressional & state elections on top of everything else it appears the American people may need a serious pouring into the streets to change things, and seriously, the people will have no choice but to get very serious.
This beast that is trying to subvert and tragically darken America's spirit will have to be stopped and will be eventually, but do you want to wait till then and does the descent into evil have to occur now? No is the answer now.
Jesus will be.
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