(National Sentinel) Corruption: In the days since fired FBI Director James Comey testified to a joint hearing of the House Judiciary and Government Oversight committees, we are learning more about the man who once ran the most powerful law enforcement agency in the country — perhaps in the world — as well as the manner in which it operates, and it isn’t boding well for our republic.
It was bad enough that Comey, who is supposed to be a smart guy and who was involved with the Justice Department for most of his professional life, ‘could not recall’ details of things he should know about 245 different times during testimony.
The manner in which he said the agency he once directed operates — if we are to take him at his word — is, frankly, frightening.
Consider these examples as noted by CNS News:
Former FBI Director James Comey told Congress last week that he remembers signing a FISA court application relating to Carter Page in October 2016, but he said he doesn’t remember if the application stated that the information had been verified.
Comey also told the House Judiciary Committee he never met nor spoke with Christopher Steele, the author of the anti-Trump dossier; he doesn’t know how Steele’s information reached the FBI; and he doesn’t know “in particular” how the FBI went about investigating the information Steele provided.
He also told Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., who was incredulous, that he didn’t know as FBI director that the Democrat-aligned law firm Perkins Coie hired Fusion GPS, at the direction of the Democrat National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign, to come up with a piece of opposition research that came to be known as the “Trump dossier” authored by a known FBI asset and former British spy Christopher Steele.
It gets better — or worse, depending on your point of view.
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House Freedom Caucus member Jim Jordan, R-Ohio., pointed out another incredible admission Comey made during his testimony in an appearance Monday night with Fox News‘ Martha McCallum: Comey said he saw no “legal precedence” to present exculpatory evidence to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court when applying for a warrant to spy on an American citizen (in this case onetime 2016 Trump campaign adviser Carter Page).
“Martha, here’s what’s scary, here’s what absurd,” Jordan said.
“Congressman Ratcliffe asked him, should exculpatory information be given to the FISA court? And his response was, we have no legal duty to do that,” Jordan said.
“Stop and think about that a second. You don’t have a duty to give all the information to the FISA judge when you’re going to go and get a warrant to go spy on a fellow American citizen? That was his response and he is the top guy at the FBI?” the Ohio Republican continued.
“That was scary when we saw that. I thought that was a great question that John asked and that was his first response. ‘I don’t think there’s a legal duty,'” Jordan continued.
“He said, certainly, we should do it, that we should give the information. But the fact he doesn’t believe there’s a legal duty to present all evidence to the FISA court, so he didn’t really think there was a legal duty to tell the court who paid for the document, he didn’t think there was a legal duty to tell the court that the guy who wrote the darn thing had been terminated because he was out leaking information to the press?” said Jordan.
“I mean, that is a scary thing that we learned from our conversation with Mr. Comey on Friday.”
Regarding the dossier specifically, Gowdy asked, according to transcripts, “While you were the Director, you never knew that the DNC hired a law firm that hired an oppo research firm that hired Christopher Steele?
“No, I don’t think so,” Comey replied. “I don’t have any recollection of being told that or reading that or learning that while I was Director.”
How could he not know or not remember a central figure in Spygate?
“Is it relevant to you who was paying Chris Steele?” Gowdy asked next.
“Yes, in the sense that I thought it was important to understand that it was a politically motivated effort, first by Republicans, then by Democrats,” Comey responded.
To be clear, Comey’s answer is not just wrong, it’s dishonest. “Republicans” did not fund the document that eventually became the Steele dossier. As Becket Adams notes at the Washington Examiner:
The Washington Free Beacon did not bankroll the Steele dossier, a highly dubious work of opposition research alleging the Russians have compromising personal and financial information on Donald Trump.
Rather, the conservative newsroom hired the same research firm that later created it, Fusion GPS, in 2016 to investigate Trump and other Republican candidates during the GOP primaries.
After Trump had won the nomination, the Free Beacon dropped the project. It was at that point that Democratic operatives swooped in, bringing along with them former British spy Christopher Steele. It is from Steele’s work that we get all this Russia business.
To reiterate, the Free Beacon had nothing to do with Steele or his work on the dossier.
How could the FBI director not know that, especially when Steele was working for him and his agency in one of the most high-profile investigations (involving presidential campaigns and nominees) in a century?
It’s bothersome that Comey is claiming ignorance of all these matters. It’s terrible that the FBI has “no legal obligation” to provide exculpatory evidence to the FISA court (or, we presume, any federal court).
But what’s terrifying is that if Comey was put in charge of the FBI with this kind of mindset, imagine how many more there are just like him who are currently serving within the bureau (and Justice Department) right now. Now, doesn’t the Robert Mueller appointment make even more sense?
Comey’s testimony provides the clearest indication yet that careerist statists like him are all about protecting and defending the self-serving system they have created, not meting out ‘justice’ on behalf of serving the American people.
That’s what should scare us more than anything else.
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