James Comey: No 'treason.' No coup. Just lies -- and dumb lies at that.
By James Comey May 28 at 5:24 PM
'It is tempting for normal people to ignore our president when he starts ranting about treason and corruption at the FBI. I understand the temptation. Im the object of many of his rants, and even I try to ignore him.
But we shouldnt, because millions of good people believe what a president of the United States says. In normal times, thats healthy. But not now, when the president is a liar who doesnt care what damage he does to vital institutions. We must call out his lies that the FBI was corrupt and committed treason, that we spied on the Trump campaign and tried to defeat Donald Trump. We must constantly return to the stubborn facts.
Russia engaged in a massive effort to interfere in the 2016 presidential election. Near as I can tell, there is only one U.S. leader who still denies that fact. The FBI saw the attack starting in mid-June 2016, with the first dumping of stolen emails. In late July, when we were hard at work trying to understand the scope of the effort, we learned that one of Trumps foreign policy advisers knew about the Russian effort seven weeks before we did.
n April 2016, that adviser talked to a Russian agent in London, learned that the Russians had obtained dirt on Hillary Clinton in the form of thousands of emails and that the Russians could assist the Trump campaign through the anonymous release of information damaging to Clinton. Of course, nobody from the Trump campaign told us this (or about later Russian approaches); we had to learn it, months after the fact, from an allied ambassador.
But when we finally learned of it in late July, what should the FBI have done? Let it go? Go tell the Trump campaign? Tell the press? No. Investigate, to see what the facts were. We didnt know what was true. Maybe there was nothing to it, or maybe Americans were actively conspiring with the Russians. To find out, the FBI would live up to its name and investigate.
As director, I was determined that the work would be done carefully, professionally and discreetly. We were just starting. If there was nothing to it, we didnt want to smear Americans. If there was something to it, we didnt want to let corrupt Americans know we were onto them. So, we kept it secret. Thats how the FBI approaches all counterintelligence cases.
And theres the first problem with Trumps whole treason narrative. If we were deep state Clinton loyalists bent on stopping him, why would we keep it secret? Why wouldnt the much-maligned FBI supervisor Peter Strzok the alleged kingpin of the treasonous plot to stop Trump tell anyone? He was one of the very few people who knew what we were investigating.
We investigated. We didnt gather information about the campaigns strategy. We didnt spy on anyones campaign.'>>>
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/james-comey-no-treason-no-coup-just-lies--and-dumb-lies-at-that/2019/05/28/45f8d802-8175-11e9-bce7-40b4105f7ca0_story.html?
dhol82
(9,353 posts)information that trump was being investigated also.
I still blame him for the whole fiasco.
dalton99a
(81,708 posts)That and the bullshit lecture you gave to Hillary in public
emmaverybo
(8,144 posts)the case well. Sick of the grudge against him no matter what he says or how well Many factors in
Hilarys loss. And it was dicey in the first place to run a candidate under investigation.
elleng
(131,457 posts)He spells out origins of the 'probe,' which trump/barr undertaking now.
creeksneakers2
(7,492 posts)Nitram
(22,981 posts)closet the election.
Skittles
(153,321 posts)fuck him