The alleged leak to the media that underpins the indictment of former FBI Director James Comey appears to relate to the 2016 investigation regarding Hillary Clinton, fairly than the separate 2016 FBI investigation of Donald Trump and Russian election meddling.
Prosecutors say within the indictment they imagine Comey had licensed an nameless leak to the press about an FBI investigation. The indictment then accuses him of mendacity beneath oath to the Senate in 2020 when he was requested whether or not he had licensed a leak, and he testified he hadn’t.
The indictment doesn’t establish which particular leaked particulars or information reviews type the core of the case.
But officers and other people concerned within the case inform NCS the false statement charge appears to center on alleged leaks for information articles concerning the FBI’s investigation of Hillary Clinton and her use of a personal email server.
For Trump, Comey’s dealing with of the investigation into him and his marketing campaign has been on the prime of the agenda. He has accused Comey of being corrupt and of damaging his first time period by leaking against him. That the 2 counts Comey faces could also be as an alternative about alleged leaks associated to the Clinton investigation represents the irony of the most recent developments. Clinton has lengthy accused Comey of damaging her marketing campaign and swinging the election to Trump.
Who are Persons 1, 2 and three?
The indictment says Comey lied when he stated he “had not ‘authorized someone else at the FBI to be an anonymous source in news reports’ regarding an FBI investigation concerning Person 1.”
The unidentified Person 1 is Clinton, in accordance to officers and other people briefed on the matter.
In one other courtroom submitting within the case documenting a charge against Comey that the grand jury didn’t approve, “Person 1” is referenced once more. In that doc, “Person 1” is extra clearly is a reference to Clinton and her “approval of a plan concerning Person 2,” who’s Trump.
More elements concerning the leak and the alleged false statement may come out in courtroom in subsequent proceedings, particularly throughout a trial.
For occasion, the particular person Comey allegedly licensed to leak about an FBI investigation is just referred to as “Person 3” within the courtroom paperwork.
A supply aware of the indictment tells NCS’s Jake Tapper that “Person 3,” the FBI particular person whom Comey allegedly licensed to leak data on his behalf, is his longtime buddy and Columbia Law School professor Daniel Richman.
Sources aware of the investigation and indications from the general public document level to unnamed “Person 3” within the indictment being Richman, who was at one level throughout Comey’s tenure a particular authorities worker on the FBI.
After Comey was fired from the FBI in May 2017, he offered memos detailing his interactions with Trump to Richman, who leaked them. Comey testified in June 2017 that he gave Richman the memos in an try to get a particular counsel appointed following his firing.
But the leak of these memos, which contained labeled data, don’t seem associated to Thursday’s indictment, which is targeted on the Clinton investigation, and never the Trump probe.
Richman lately got here in for an interview with the FBI and was given a subpoena, sources stated.
Richman isn’t accused of any wrongdoing within the Comey indictment.
The risk stays that Person 3 may have been former deputy FBI Director Andy McCabe, who’s now a NCS contributor.
In Comey’s testimony cited within the indictment, Sen. Ted Cruz particularly asks Comey about statements from McCabe that the Texas Republican stated contradicted Comey’s prior testimony. Comey responded he stood by his testimony.
But a number of sources stated that whereas Cruz’s query referenced McCabe, Person 3 appeared to be Richman.
Richman’s lawyer declined to remark. The US legal professional’s workplace for the Eastern District of Virginia, which is prosecuting the matter, additionally declined to remark.
It’s not but clear what particular information tales contained the knowledge Comey is accused of authorizing to be leaked.
The FBI beforehand investigated throughout Trump’s first time period the disclosure of labeled data in 4 information tales from 2017, which was codenamed “Arctic Haze.” Several of the tales in query have been about Comey’s dealing with of the Clinton investigation.
According to FBI paperwork declassified and turned over to Congress final month, Richman advised investigators he spoke with a New York Times reporter about labeled data in January 2017, although Richman stated the reporter knew extra concerning the data than he did.
Comey on indictment: “I’m innocent… Let’s have a trial”
“Richman was pretty sure he did not confirm the Classified Information. However, Richman told the interviewing agents he was sure ‘with a discount,’” Richman advised FBI investigators in November 2019.
But on the similar time, Richman advised investigators that “Comey never asked him to talk to the media.”
The declassified FBI recordsdata state that Comey “used Richman as a liaison to the media,” to appropriate tales vital of Comey, although the paperwork don’t state he licensed Richman particularly to focus on the Clinton investigation with reporters.
For almost a decade, Comey has been beneath intense political scrutiny and a number of investigations for his dealing with of the 2 2016 investigations, one round Clinton, and the opposite round Trump, each of which performed a task within the presidential marketing campaign that yr.
Trump’s allies — each in political appointments in his administration and within the Republican Party on Capitol Hill — have voiced their anger towards Comey’s oversight of the FBI because it labored on the Russia investigation.
They have expressed far much less concern along with his announcement late within the 2016 marketing campaign concerning the FBI re-opening the Clinton email server investigation due to materials discovered on Anthony Weiner’s laptop computer. Clinton was by no means charged, however Democrats say that Comey’s announcement and the mistrust it sowed amongst voters was a consider her shedding the 2016 election to Trump.
Even in a statement saying the indictment of Comey on Thursday, the present FBI Director Kash Patel smacked his company once more for the investigation it carried out round Trump in 2016.
“Nowhere was this politicization of law enforcement more blatant than during the Russiagate hoax, a disgraceful chapter in history we continue to investigate and expose,” Patel wrote on X.
NCS’s Casey Gannon contributed to this report.