FBI Director James Comey Has To Go
By Jay Sekulow
ACLJ
FBI Director James Comey has broken the sacred trust of the American people.
He conducted a faux investigation into the State Department email scandal in which dozens of confidential and top-secret emails passing through an unsecured, private server put our national security at risk.
He handed out immunity deals to most of the major players involved in the investigation. He ignored evidence to protect the Clinton Team from prosecution. He put President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton’s political legacy ahead of the law.
He made secret deals to destroy evidence, thwarting congressional subpoenas. That’s called obstruction of justice. It’s a crime. James Comey violated the law. He violated his oath of office. It’s corruption at the highest level.
Enough is enough.
The FBI Director’s job is to uphold the law, not break it. His job is to investigate crimes, not commit them. It’s time for the Obama Administration’s FBI Director James Comey to resign. If not, Congress should impeach him and remove him from office.
The Constitution is clear about impeachment.
Article I, Section 2 dictates, “The House of Representatives shall choose their speaker and other officers; and shall have the sole power of impeachment.” Article I, Section 3 further includes, “The Senate shall have the sole power to try all impeachments. When sitting for that purpose, they shall be on oath or affirmation. When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside: And no person shall be convicted without the concurrence of two thirds of the members present. Judgment in cases of impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any office of honor, trust or profit under the United States: but the party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to indictment, trial, judgment and punishment, according to law.”
Article II, Section 4 details who is subject to impeachment: “The President, Vice President and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”
FBI Director James Comey is a civil officer of the United States subject to impeachment by Congress.
Here are the plain facts – if anyone else had done what the FBI did in this faux investigation, they would be subject to felony convictions and decades in prison. If that’s not high crimes and misdemeanors, I’m not sure what is.
Here are the facts:
On July 5, 2016 FBI Director Comey delivered a statement conceding that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had engaged in “extremely careless” behavior by transmitting classified information through her unsecured personal email system. The FBI’s investigation was initiated because of a referral from the Intelligence Community Inspector General. The FBI sought to determine whether there was evidence that classified information was improperly stored, transmitted, mishandled or, alternatively, whether such information was knowingly removed from appropriate systems or storage facilities. FBI Director Comey conceded that at least 100 emails in 52 email chains on Mrs. Clinton’s email system contained classified information at the time they were sent or received. After admitting that there is evidence that Mrs. Clinton and her aides were extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information and after finding evidence that potential violations of the statutes regarding classified information occurred, Director Comey declined to make a criminal referral to the Department of Justice. He stated that “no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case.” Despite mountains of incriminating evidence, and despite the March 2015 issuance by Congress of a subpoena to Mrs. Clinton to produce documents, Director Comey stated that criminal charges could not be brought because the evidence failed to support an inference of intentional misconduct.
This is an outrage and the passage of time shows that the FBI and the Justice Department were actively complicit in ensuring that this investigation was never going anywhere. As it turns out, the FBI engaged in conduct that prevents Congress from exercising its constitutional duties.
It was a faux investigation from the very beginning. The relevant statute (18 U.S.C. 793(f)) does not have an intent requirement. That’s why the FBI never reviewed former Secretary of State Clinton’s sworn testimony to Congress despite the fact that any reasonable prosecutor knows that false testimony constitutes circumstantial evidence of intent.
After the New York Times reported in March 2015 that Secretary Clinton had a private email system, Clinton aide Cheryl Mills engaged in affirmative behavior that led to the destruction of relevant evidence. There was already a congressional subpoena outstanding relating to the Benghazi investigation, but that didn’t stop members of Clinton’s team from deleting emails from the server. We also know that other Clinton aides destroyed some mobile devices with hammers.
You can’t make this up. But every day, every hour, it seems we find out yet even more details that make this even worse. How could FBI Director James Comey have turned a blind eye to all of this? Because he was a part of the cover-up.
Now we know that the FBI signed secret side deals with Cheryl Mills and Heather Samuelson – the two lawyers in charge of sifting through Clinton’s emails – to not only give them immunity for their laptops, but to also destroy the laptops and evidence after the investigation concluded. But the investigation wasn’t even thorough BECA– USE they promised them they wouldn’t look at any data after January 31, 2015, meaning they wouldn’t look at anything after the news of the private email server became public.
So the FBI couldn’t have ever found any evidence about obstruction of justice or destruction of evidence. And now Congress can’t find it as part of its investigations – because the FBI destroyed the evidence as part of the immunity deal and side deal with Clinton aides.
The latest reports involve missing “bankers boxes” filled with former Secretary Clinton’s emails and evidence of tampering with those emails to try to change classification designations. Not surprisingly, one of the lawyers involved in this latest report was at the State Department during the email scandal and had previously served at the IRS during the Lois Lerner scandal.
And now there is evidence that the Obama White House coordinated with the Clinton campaign in early 2015 regarding how they would all handle any fallout from the revelations about former Secretary Clinton’s private email server.
This is not difficult. It’s clear that the FBI was compromised and more concerned with politics than following the law.
How else can you explain the FBI destroying evidence subject to congressional subpoenas? 18 U.S.C. § 1519 deals with the destruction of evidence:
Whoever knowingly alters, destroys, mutilates, conceals, covers up, falsifies, or makes a false entry in any record, document, or tangible object with the intent to impede, obstruct, or influence the investigation or proper administration of any matter within the jurisdiction of any department or agency of the United States or any case filed under title 11, or in relation to or contemplation of any such matter or case, shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.
18 U.S.C. 1512(c) deals with obstruction of justice:
Whoever corruptly alters, destroys, mutilates, or conceals a record, document, or other object, or attempts to do so, with the intent to impair the object’s integrity or availability for use in an official proceeding; or otherwise obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding, or attempts to do so, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.
It is clear that FBI Director Comey participated in actions that sabotaged both an ongoing Congressional investigation and an impartial criminal investigation into former Secretary of State Clinton’s use of an unsecured server to transmit classified information. Since the FBI actively participated in both the obstruction of justice and the destruction of evidence relating to a constitutionally recognized congressional subpoena, and since it is clear that every other American who engaged in such conduct would face criminal charges within the meaning of 18 U.S.C. section 1519 or 18 U.S.C. section 1512(c) for destroying evidence, impeding an ongoing investigation or impairing the integrity of an official proceeding, this leaves Congress with only one solemn alternative.
Congress should expeditiously consider bringing impeachment proceeding against Director Comey for his role in commencing and sabotaging this investigation. The American people must be assured that the system isn’t rigged.
Our senior litigation team is working with Congress, demanding the removal of Director Comey. We’ve already filed four federal lawsuits to hold the Obama Administration accountable for its lawlessness.
Defend the Constitution from corruption. Join us in demanding President Obama’s FBI Director resign or be impeached and sign our petition below today.