The Comey Ouster

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President Trump has fired FBI director James Comey, who had made himself eminently fireable.

Last July, Comey took it upon himself to become not only the nation’s top policeman, but its top prosecutor, explaining in a long press conference that Hillary Clinton had clearly broken the law by hosting classified information on her private e-mail server, but that there was not “clear evidence that Secretary Clinton or her colleagues intended to violate laws.” As we observed at the time, the relevant statute does not require “intent,” only “gross negligence” — which adequately described the behavior Comey termed “reckless” and “extremely careless” — and, in any event, deciding whether to prosecute was not up to him, but to then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch. The entire event was, as longtime Justice Department hands noted, unprecedented.

Democrats, who in the wake of Tuesday evening’s news are breathless with Watergate comparisons, seem suddenly to have recalled their past enthusiasm for Comey’s “independence” and “integrity.”

Most Democrats have spent the last several months incensed at Comey, after he announced just days before November’s presidential election that the FBI was reopening its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s e-mails, based on evidence found on the computer of Anthony Weiner, husband of Clinton’s right-hand woman Huma Abedin. (Yesterday, the Justice Department confirmed that Abedin did in fact send classified information to Weiner’s unsecured e-mail account.) Democrats, among them then-Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, suggested that Comey’s letter may have violated the Hatch Act, which restricts political activity by certain government officials. That anger intensified when, a few days later, Comey said, in effect, “Never mind,” and re-closed the reopened investigation, reaffirming the FBI’s previous conclusion: She broke the law, but so what?

On Tuesday evening, accounting for Comey’s termination, this sequence of events was laid out in a long memo by Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein, whose tenure at the Department of Justice began just two weeks ago. Rosenstein’s presentation of the facts is fair and scrupulous. In addition to explaining how Comey repeatedly defied longstanding Justice Department precedent throughout the Clinton e-mail investigation, he cites critical comments from attorneys and deputy attorneys general from the last several administrations, both Republican and Democratic. Rosenstein rightly observes: “Almost everyone agrees that the Director made serious mistakes; it is one of the few issues that unites people of diverse perspectives.” Indeed, the only person who did not agree is James Comey, who has seemed incapable of admitting obvious errors, and has in effect asserted that his investigative “independence” makes him accountable to no one.

Democrats, having spent the last several months accusing Comey of intervening to throw the presidential election to Donald Trump, are now suggesting that he is an indispensable man. Senator Brian Schatz declared on Twitter: “We are in a full-fledged constitutional crisis.”

Deep breaths, Senator.

It is well documented that the Russian government attempted to interfere in November’s election, but there remains no concrete evidence that anyone in the Trump campaign was in on it — let alone that Trump himself “colluded” his way into the Oval Office. Furthermore, speculations to the contrary are in no small part based on a misunderstanding of what Comey said in his March testimony before the House Intelligence Committee: There is an ongoing counterintelligence investigation into Russia’s election interference; there is no ongoing criminal investigation by the FBI of President Trump or his campaign.

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it was just a matter of time when comey was gong to be fired. recall that this POS sat on the board of directors of the clinton foundation. the irs investigation was nothing but smoke and mirrors. chucky shomer another POS needs to be removed from office. how much is he still making on illegal immigrants and high price green card scam. where is the alleged Constitutional crisis. Trump is the President and he is acting like one. the asshole before him did nothing but kill America. just another three days in the headline and it will become history.
Steven Price noted in one of his recent works ” All the we remember will one day be forgotten.” comey defiled the Constitution.