The Department of Justice’s internal watchdog released a much-anticipated report on the FBI’s investigation of Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server as secretary of state.
The report contained several bombshells.
Anti-Trump FBI agent showed “willingness” to impact election
Anti-Trump FBI agent Peter Strzok showed a “willingness to take official action” to impact the presidential election, according to the new report from Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz.
““(Trump’s) not ever going to become president, right? Right?!” asked another anti-Trump FBI agent, Lisa Page. “No. No he’s not. We’ll stop it,” Strzok replied.
Strzok’s text “is not only indicative of a biased state of mind but, even more seriously, implies a willingness to take official action to impact the presidential candidate’s electoral prospects,” the report said.
FBI sat on Weiner emails for no good reason
When further Clinton emails were discovered on a laptop belonging to former congressman Anthony Weiner, who is married to longtime Clinton aide Huma Abedin, the FBI agents overseeing her case took just under a month to take meaningful action, Horowitz’s report found.
No later than Sept. 29, 2016, FBI executives and the agents who oversaw the Clinton email investigation were informed that “that Weiner investigation agents had discovered 141,000 emails on Weiner’s laptop that were potentially relevant to the [Clinton email] investigation.” Comey didn’t authorize a search warrant until Oct. 27, after he was briefed on them that day, the IG report found.
Former deputy director Andrew McCabe was aware of the emails’ existence on Weiner’s laptop and told Horowitz’s team that he considered them to be a “big deal” but failed to move the investigation forward until agents from the New York field office began asking questions, the report shows.
Horowitz’s team of investigators “did not identify a consistent or persuasive explanation for the FBI’s failure to act for almost a month after learning of potential [Clinton investigation-related] emails on the Weiner laptop,” the report said.
HFBI prioritized Russia investigation over Clinton emails on Weiner’s computer, possibly due to political bias
The FBI prioritized investigating the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia over the discovered emails on Weiner’s laptop, possibly due to political bias, according to the report. Anti-Trump agent Peter Strzok was intimately involved with that decision.
Noting Strzok’s “willingness” to use the FBI to stop Trump, the report said, “we did not have confidence that Strzok’s decision to prioritize the Russia investigation over following up on the Midyear-related investigative lead discovered on the Weiner laptop was free from bias.”
Comey acted like the rules didn’t apply to him
The report portrayed Comey as insubordinate and consistently acting with disregard to DOJ policies.
Both in his decision to publicly announce the results of the Clinton email investigation in July and in his decision to notify Congress when the investigation was reopened, former FBI Director James Comey “engaged in ad hoc decision-making based on his personal views, even if it meant rejecting longstanding Department policy or practice,” the IG report found.
Comey also used a personal email for official government business in violation of DOJ policy, Horowitz’s report found.
FBI riddled with leaks, FBI employees receive benefits from journalists
“We identified numerous FBI employees, at all levels of the organization and with no official reason to be in contact with the media, who were nevertheless in frequent contact with reporters,” the report noted.
“We have profound concerns about the volume and extent of unauthorized media contacts by FBI personnel that we have uncovered during our review,” the report said.
“In addition, we identified instances where FBI employees improperly received benefits from reporters, including tickets to sporting events, golfing outings, drinks and meals, and admittance to nonpublic social events.”
The IG will file a separate report on those investigations when they are concluded, the report stated.
More anti-Trump bias at the FBI
An FBI attorney who worked on the special counsel’s Russia investigation until earlier this year sent numerous anti-Trump text messages to a colleague, according to the IG report. One of the attorney’s texts exclaimed: “Viva le Resistance.”
This article has been updated to include additional information
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