This is why you don’t want to rush a response to a 500-page inspector-general report. Former FBI Director James Comey, writing on the New York Times op-ed page, posted just a short time ago:
First, the inspector general’s team went through the F.B.I.’s work with a microscope and found no evidence that bias or improper motivation affected the investigation, which I know was done competently, honestly and independently.
That’s . . . not quite accurate. From the FBI inspector-general’s report, page 149:
. . . these text messages also caused us to assess Strzok’s decision in October 2016 to prioritize the Russia investigation over following up on the Midyear-related investigative lead discovered on the Weiner laptop. We concluded that we did not have confidence that this decision by Strzok was free from bias.
And then on page 161:
Nevertheless, we found that Page’s statement, on its face, consisted of a recommendation that the Midyear team consider how Clinton would treat the FBI if she were to become President in deciding how to handle Clinton’s interview. Suggesting that investigative decisions be based on this consideration was inappropriate and created an appearance of bias.
And then on page 420-421:
Press conference after listing all the political bias, not 1 single pro Trump or 1 anti Hillary text, ““we’ll stop candidate Trump from being elected ” Wacky Wray pulls a Comey and finds no political bias. This isnt bad for the FBI this is bad for those that used their positions in the FBI to meddle in the election and give a skate party to an proven felon. When was this press release written and by whom?
Nobody inside the FBI intentionally meddled with the election, though a number of poor decisions were made. The Inspector General concluded that nothing they did demonstrated any procedural bias against Donald Trump—only the presence of negative opinion about him. If anything, Comey’s decision to announce Hillary Clinton was under investigation only 2 weeks ahead of the election gave Trump a significant advantage. This was exploited by the Trump campaign to the fullest possible extent, and may have actually given him the presidency.
As it turned out, that investigation ultimately turned up nothing that supported the filing of any charges against Hillary Clinton—a conclusion reached through an investigative process with which the Inspector General found no problems. More than a year later, the investigation of Donald Trump is anything but over.
@Greg: You try destuction of evidence under subponea see if the investigators get the feelz that they would not prosecute.
According to the FBI findings, Clinton’s staff requested that her personal emails be deleted from her server long before any subpoena was ever issued. The FBI also concluded there was no evidence that the request was made in anticipation of a subpoena, that any work-related emails were intentionally deleted as part of that process, and that there was no evidence any classified material had been intentionally mishandled.
Further, the Inspector General has found that there’s no indication of an internal political bias that led the FBI to reach those conclusions. There are a number of things the Inspector General’s report is highly critical of, but how those conclusions were reached isn’t one of them.
@Greg: Once a subpoena is issued the attorneys that have no security clearance dont get to choose what is evidence, the emails should have been submitted as is. Are her yoga and wedding and funeral arrangements so embarrassingly personal …really? 33 thousand she never called in a single thing did any of the arrangements by appointment or had her aides make any of these arrangements every one an email? No I dont believe that at all. Many were arrangements of pay for play are the more likely, thats why the bleach bit.
The claim that Clinton or her staff deleted emails after a subpoena was issued originated with Donald Trump, who made that accusation on October 9, 2016. The claim isn’t true.
Platte River Networks, the internet technology service provider managing Clinton’s server, was advised by Clinton’s staff not to retain her personal material on December 5, 2014, after they had identified and provided her work related email to the State Department in accordance with their request. No subpoena was involved. There was no legal requirement that she retain personal communications, nor was it unlawful for her to use a personal server.
The Benghazi Committee issued a subpoena demanding that she turn over all email on her server on March 4, 2014.
Sometime later that month, a Platte River Network employee realized the personal material hadn’t been properly deleted from the server archive as requested, so he hastily did so at that point, without further instruction from Clinton or her staff.
Those are the verified facts, which have been turned into a tale that Clinton knowingly defied a House subpoena.
Trump can tell the tale all he wants. It may be useful to him, but that doesn’t make it true. He doesn’t exactly have a reputation for truthfulness.
Read the whole report.
Turns out the “investigation” was a collection of asking guilty parties about their actions then TAKING THEIR WORD about how “accidental,” or “inadvertent” it was.
According to these guilty parties, it was just following orders, not realizing how it looked, having a brain fart about FBI rules, and many other excuses.
Investigators never pushed any of them but took their word every time.
on Aug. 1, 2013, the Oversight Committee issued a subpoena covering the documents asked for, but not received, after the Sept. 20, 2012 request.
For the time period of January 1, 2011 through December 31, 2012, any and all documents and communications in your possession, and/or sent from or received by the email addresses hdr22@clintonemail.com“>hdr22@clintonemail.com, hrod17@clintonemail.com,”>hrod17@clintonemail.com, or any other email address or communications device used by you or another on your behalf, referring or relating to:
(a) Libya (including but not limited to Benghazi and Tripoli);
(b) weapons located or found in, imported or brought into, and/or exported or removed from Libya;
(c) the attacks on U.S. facilities in Benghazi, Libya on September 11, 2012 and September 12, 2012, or;
(d) statements pertaining to the attacks on U.S. facilities in Benghazi, Libya on September 11, 2012 or September 12, 2012.
Remember that at that time the Benghazi Committee had not received a single Clinton email related to Benghazi.
It’s clear Clinton did not turn over all her work-related emails to the State Department on Dec. 5, 2014, as she claimed on many occasions. The FBI said it recovered “17,448 unique work-related and personal e-mails” that Clinton had not turned over. Of those, at least 30 were said to contain references to Benghazi and thus would have been responsive to the various congressional requests and subpoenas going back to Sept. 20, 2012.
Attempt to delete these emails in violation of The Federal Records Act, as amended (44 U.S.C. Chapters 21, 29, 31, and 33).
No subpoenas is a lie easily debunked with a cursory search.
Looks like the top FBI people have no integrity! Yet, Greg and the lefties continue to support them. These are criminal offences. Where is Rich? He should be defending America against these criminals, if he really were a “real” Marine who took the oath.
@Randy: This was a practical joke, here is a list of all our crimes so to teach ourselves a lesson we will make this a learning moment, really no accountability. Those bribing a federal officer should be prosecuted, those taking those bribes should be fired.
This happens only in an organization with corrupt leaders. The rank and file tend to represent the bias, opinion and direction of the leaders. If this can not be considered a major threat to the security of our country by all citizens, hen it is already too late!
@Greg:
Maybe instead of listening to CNN and MSNBC you should refer to what is actually IN the report. It’s right there. In this article, it’s even in BOLD.
And who’s fault was that? Was that an effort by McCabe to keep the contents of Weiner’s laptop secret until then to help Trump? Or, was he trying to keep it from coming to light until after Hillary won so she could have everything obliterated, as she did all her computers, servers, laptops and phones? The only reason the contents of the laptop became public was because New York was wanting to know what was going on with it, as they were filing sexual predator charges against Weenie. That WAS unfortunate for Hillary (though I doubt it changed any minds of her faithful morons) but it was McCabe’s fault, nothing intended to help Trump by any means. What if Hillary had won, THEN all this was found out? Oh… that’s right. It would have all vanished. THAT was the PLAN.
See above. They had a BIG problem with it. In fact, the report recommends that the FBI reevaluate its entire process, as it failed miserably here. Bringing charges would have been pointless when everyone has been granted immunity and all the evidence has been destroyed. Why do innocent people behave in such a way?
Oh, no doubt. It’s all Democrats have and they are pinning all their hopes on it; they certainly have no hope of ever offering any viable solutions to any problems which appeal to voters.
Hillary purged her server when she got notified the emails were wanted as evidence. The IG report stated that Hillary’s IT guy, Combetta, lied 4 times to the FBI. Has HE been indicted? Uh… no.
Except they weren’t “personal”. Once she decided to conduct all State Department business on her secret, private, unsecured (definitely hacked, that information removed from Comey’s report… OBSTRUCTION) server, they ALL became State Department emails. Hillary doesn’t get to (well, outside the world where no laws or rules apply to Hillary) decide what the State Department wants to archive and what it doesn’t. If she didn’t want any of her yoga emails about how she sh!t her tights trying to sit down or fell over drunk seen by anyone, she should not have put classified emails (do you still deny THAT?) on her server.
Again, the report says Combetta lied numerous times.
@kitt:
The left has to base their entire argument and accusations against Trump on how trustworthy Hillary is, a weak and shaky defense at best. I would challenge anyone to find an instance where Hillary actually told the truth.
@Randy:
Up until now, with very few exceptions, the integrity of the FBI was unimpeachable. Just look at what Obama did to it.
https://www.dailywire.com/news/31867/12-things-you-need-know-about-inspector-generals-ben-shapiro
@Randy:
That’s the key; Hillary winning was a PROMISE. The media promised it and worked towards it, the DOJ promised it and worked towards it and the FBI promised it and worked towards it. Why are these names redacted?
Why was the text message “we will stop it” withheld from Congress until this report was released?
THIS was influenced by the leaders at the very top. Obama created a culture of corruption. The DOJ, the IRS, the EPA, the VA, the BLM, the FBI… all corrupted by Obama.
No doubt the next report will be just as damning, but reopening an investigation would be pretty pointless; all the participants have been granted immunity and all the evidence has been destroyed. The only difference between now and if Hillary had actually won is that we found out about it all. I guess that will have to suffice.
@Deplorable Me: Not only are the names redacted they redacted who did the redacting. They had a month to rework this.
“The names have been changed to protect the guilty.”
The FBI agent that interviewed Hillary called her “the President”
https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/terence-p-jeffrey/fbi-agent-who-questioned-hillary-email-probe-called-her-president-4
I wonder what they called her testimony before Congress where she stated she did not send, receive or store any classified information on her private, secret unsecured server?
@kitt, #8:
This one? I don’t see where it asks for Clinton’s personal emails, or any reference at all to Clinton’s email addresses or server.
And who did Issa’s witch-hunting party subpoena? Not Hillary Clinton. They subpoenaed the State Department, which Hillary Clinton had ceased to be in charge of or connected with effective January 2, 2013. She, of course, was their target, because she was the most likely 2016 Democratic Party presidential candidate. They had no one who could beat her, and they knew it.
After seven interminable, hostile, politically-motivated Benghazi investigations—none of which came up with any credible evidence of willful misconduct—I’m pretty much done with these people and their never-ending conspiracy theories.
Trump resurrected all the same old bullshit on the campaign trail. Now he and his truth-challenged enablers are trying to use it all over again, this time to distract from multiple investigations that he always seems to be at the center of. They would defame honorable public servants and pull of the nation’s law enforcement institutions down to their own level, just run interference and cover trails of malfeasance, all of which seem to lead in the same general direction.
Trump’s recurring “witch hunt” accusation would almost be comical, since the GOP’s dysfunctional Congressional majorities have kept multiple examples of such political exercises going on nonstop for years. He’s attempted to launch one after the other himself, targeting whomever he views as a threat. His congressional tools obediently run after every stick he throws by way of his Twitter account. That, too, is almost comical. It all ceases to be funny, however, when you take note of the damage it’s doing to the country. He has managed to turn the flag itself into an instrument of division.
@Randy: We got Trump’s guy Wray in charge. I like him—should handle this.
I also like lifelong Repub and decorated Marine Mueller.
What more do you want?
Your thoughts on DT saluting NK Gen? Rocket Man loved it—This punk loves his new found status–think he’ll actually disarm?
@Greg:
Well, they were supposed to have all of Hillary’s emails. If she hadn’t been avoiding FOI requests by setting up an illegal, private, secret, unsecured email server in her bathroom, they would have been the go-to source for her emails. Starting to see why she had that server in the first place?
I’m pretty sure denying the security the Ambassador begged for and ignoring the intelligence that showed the terrorist threats against the consulate was willful misconduct. Also, though knowing in real time it was a planned terrorist attack, lying about it being caused by a video is willful misconduct… that is, if you regard lying “misconduct”.
The suit against the Trump charity is not drawing enough attention from this nasty report, so Mueller had to have Manafort arrested. What a F**KING joke! As if we need more proof this is anything but a political witch hunt, along comes Mueller to present it is bold, 10,000pt capital letters on a banner!
@Nanny G: Not only that, but it looks like two different parties wrote it- one did the body with all the damning facts/evidence and the other did the Conclusion which contradicted all the evidence laid out. You would have to either be an idiot or a defense attorney who is protecting the client in order to do that. Remember why the report’s release was delayed all those days? It was to give the attorneys for the wrongdoers the opportunity to put their input into the report. That is the most likely reason for the big contradiction between the damning evidence in the body and the exoneration in the Conclusion. It would be interesting to read the report without the input from the defense attorneys.
I don’t know if you read Session’s response to the report. He laid out some not so subtle hints. He said that the report was just the beginning and made reference to Huber’s parallel criminal investigation. Notice in the report that the Classified appendix and the Law Enforcement appendix are blank. There is most likely a reason for that. Among other things, Hillary’s emails were obtained by foreign payers. At least one of those emails contained Secret intelligence meaning she compromised national security. Secret material is defined as material that could cause serious damage to national security if released. That compromise was swept under the table when anyone else would have been prosecuted for it. This could get a lot worse. BTW- notice how relatively tame Trump’s response has been to all of this? Hmmmm.
Not her personal email. There was no requirement that non-work-related material be retained or provided to anyone.
But it wasn’t illegal. Nor was Hillary Clinton the only elected public official to use one. Nor is there evidence it was hacked—which is more than can be said for the State Department’s computer system.
Trump supporters are sure of many things that are demonstrably not true. That would be an example. Seven formal, taxpayer-funded investigations, conducted by the GOP’s own, and no such conclusion was ever found to be supported by evidence.
Attempted witness tampering is a crime. The judge was presented with compelling evidence that Mannafort made such an attempt.
The Trump Foundation was used in an illegal fashion. Multiple state and federal laws were willfully broken. The Attorney General of New York says she has evidence to prove it, and intends to do so.
@Greg: Every work related email was suppose to be downloaded to the State dept within a timeline, that wasnt done so she was guilty of the espionage act by removal and retention of classified government records.
We have been down this road Greggie and its obvious there was bias. The subpeona “For the time period of January 1, 2011 through December 31, 2012, any and all documents and communications in your possession.” She must have been cackling good knowing she stole all the government records and had no intention of giving them up.
Section 641 of Title 18, guilty.
@Randy:
That organization was the entire Obama administration. In addition to the criminal aspect, look at what it has done to the FBI as a whole. Taking petty bribes? Embarrassing. The comments about Trump supporters being uneducated, lazy pieces of shit will do wonders for their standing with tens of millions of Americans. Some of those people also happen to be police officers and sheriffs (who have lots of clout in the LE area) as well as their fellow FBI agents who aren’t part of the “Seventh Floor”. If you were local law enforcement, would you want to back up an FBI agent after all those demeaning statements?
The ones I feel for the most are the field agents outside DC who had nothing to do with this but will have to live with it. But hey, according to Comey and friends they are uneducated, lazy pieces of shit if they didn’t vote for Hillary.
So why do you think the DOJ, headed by a Trump appointee, hasn’t brought charges against Hillary Clinton?
Clearly there’s a slight problem with your assertion that Clinton broke all sorts of laws. As in, she didn’t.
Lies may work just fine in the world of reality television politics, but they hit the brick wall of reality when it comes to courtroom requirements for actual evidence. A courtroom is where Trump & Company are ultimately headed—not Clinton.
@another vet: Your last sentence—where did Comey say that about his agents?–Trumpists should thank Comey for putting DT in office.
How bout Wray—you OK with him? How bout Sessions? Giuliani? Cohen? Manafort?
You trust Rocket Man like DT says he does?
Laura I at Fox—among many others–calling for resignation of Pruitt. your thoughts?
@Greg: Keep repeating that to yourself.
http://dailycaller.com/2015/09/21/eight-laws-hillary-clinton-could-be-indicted-for-breaking/
The Daily Caller would be a birdcage liner, if printed on paper. They’re major contributors to the right’s collective delusional state.
@Greg:
What constituted “personal”? Who decided what was “personal”? Oh yeah, that’s right… HILLARY decided what was “personal”… and BLEACHBIT it away for good. Seriously, Greg… you can’t imagine how utterly suspicious this is, even if it wasn’t the most corrupt, lying individual that did it?
Umm… because all the evidence has been destroyed and the principle players/suspects given immunity?
Yes, she did. It was only Comey’s interpretation that there was no intent (there WAS… she intentionally set up the private, secret, unsecured server with the intent to traffic State Department classified information across it) that he used as an excuse not to prosecute. He did this, as he said, because he assumed she was going to win. As the law and the report says, INTENT has nothing to do with it; she broke NUMEROUS laws. WHY was she not prosecuted? It’s all in the report and it’s ALL political.
Yes it was. Putting classified information on it was illegal.
No. Apparently so did Comey. And Lynch. Scumbags of a feather….
The FBI says you are full of shit. It WAS hacked and foreign entities got access to them… according to the FBI. AND they knew it when they were declaring Hillary innocent before they even started interviewing people.
http://www.politifact.com/wisconsin/statements/2016/oct/07/paul-ryan/state-department-under-hillary-clinton-refused-sec/
Golly, the suit was just filed yesterday (to draw attention from the damage of the IG report) but you seem to know the verdict. Is this another Comey-style investigation? Most likely… yes.
@Greg: So you cant refute the content so attack the source not working never did. Of course if I was quoting snopes, politifact or CNN….
The Daily Caller is an unbiased news outlet to the same extent that the Huffington Post is an unbiased news outlet. I don’t follow or quote either one, for the same reason.
@Greg: Refute the content the FBI wasnt unbiased so this source is just fine.
@Deplorable Me:
If there were credible evidence of intentional mishandling of classified information, Clinton would be prosecuted. Apparently there isn’t. Nobody has to convince Trump cult members of that, only the DOJ. Which happens to be headed by a Trump appointee.
Maybe Jeff Sessions is part of the conspiracy. He’s probably a Obama operative in deep cover. That probably should be fully investigated, at taxpayer expense.
@Greg:
Sure, UNLESS those doing the investigation did not want her out of the campaign, assumed she would win and feared her bitchy retribution if they followed the rules and laws. That is exactly what the report spells out. Perhaps they should have used larger print for people like yourself that have such problems seeing and understanding FACTS.
Who has inspected the veracity of the AG and the integrity of his investigation. Observing an obvious meltdown of FBI credibility at the command level calls into question ALL of the constituent members. Apparently they are a culture of covering their asses and using their office for profit, ie Comey and Mueller. If a special counsel were called it should have been to investigate the corruption throughout the DOJ, ie Loretta and Bill on the tarmac. JR