Inspector general found Comey
'insubordinate' in Clinton probe, while a Strzok text recovered last
month, suggests the agent may have acted for political reasons much
later than initially believed; Catherine Herridge goes in-depth for
'Special Report.'
Would you consider a jihadist biased against Jews?
Could a member of a white supremacist group be accused of bias against
non-whites?
The Justice Department’s inspector general, Michael Horowitz, and FBI Director Christopher Wray claim the
500-plus-page report found no “documented” evidence that
political bias
at the FBI directly influenced the findings in the Clinton
investigation or the Justice Department’s decision not to prosecute the
former secretary of state. People in “flyover country” are more likely
to believe pigs can fly than they are to accept that political bias did
not expose a clear intent to damage presidential candidate Donald Trump.
Why does one need a document to prove bias? If the anti-Trump political beliefs of FBI employees, which are documented in
text messages, did not influence their work then why is Director Wray ordering all of his employees to undergo
training, including, reports CNN, “instruction ‘on what went wrong so these mistakes will never be repeated.’”?
Members of the media might also benefit from ethics training since the IG report found multiple
incidents of journalists doing favors for FBI agents, presumably in return for information.
Huffpost
writes, “Other instant messages showed FBI employees referring to Trump
as ‘Drumpf,’ calling Trump supporters ‘retarded’ and ‘lazy POS’ …
joking about Trump’s election signaling the fall of the Republic, and
writing ‘Viva le resistance.’” How can anyone claim that people with
such strong political views could approach their work objectively? If
perception is reality, then a connection between bias and behavior is
reality for average people, who include most citizens outside the
Beltway.
Among the things people hate about Washington is that
no matter how many higher-ups are alleged to have broken laws and
violated ethics codes, few are held accountable.
“The damage caused by (the agents’) actions ... goes to
the heart of the FBI’s reputation for neutral fact-finding and
political independence,” says the
report.
This seems to suggest that the behavior of certain agents was not
neutral and that the agents did not display political independence.
Again, how could the agents’ political views be harmful if those views
did not impact their work?
Another of many disturbing findings by the IG was that
President Obama and 12 high officials in his administration exchanged
unsecured emails with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, including
times when she was overseas and presumably more vulnerable to hacks.
Some of those emails, Horowitz says, contained classified information.
President Obama claimed during a 2015
interview
with CBS News that he learned Clinton was using an unsecured server
when he read about it in the media. The IG report revealed this was not
the case.
Numerous people, some unnamed, come in for strong
criticism in the Horowitz report. Former FBI Director James Comey is
cited for effectively taking matters into his own hands and becoming his
own authority in public statements about Hillary Clinton’s emails. A
Wall Street Journal
editorial said of Comey: “The unavoidable conclusion is that Mr.
Comey’s FBI became a law unto itself, accountable to no one but the
former director’s self-righteous conscience. His refusal to follow
proper guidelines interfered with a presidential election campaign in a
way that has caused millions of Americans in both parties to justifiably
cry foul.”
Among the things people hate about Washington is that
no matter how many higher-ups are alleged to have broken laws and
violated ethics codes, few are held accountable. The fix was in on
Hillary Clinton even before she was interviewed with two of her lawyers
present, which the IG report says violated accepted practices.
Horowitz and Wray are now
testifying
before the Senate Judiciary Committee. While Democrats will categorize
the IG report as nothing, Republicans must burrow in and get even more
facts than the disturbing, even disgusting ones he has already
uncovered. The Justice Department should then hold accountable those
people who broke the law and the rules.
Cal Thomas is America's most widely syndicated op-ed columnist. His latest book is "
What Works: Common Sense Solutions for a Stronger America". Readers may email Cal Thomas at tcaeditors@tribune.com.