A critical report accuses the FBI of sloppiness and at least the appearance of bias in its investigation into then-presidential candidate Donald Trump, his campaign team and their alleged ties to the Russian government for the 2016 presidential election. a long-awaited report about the origins of that FBI investigation.
Special counsel John Durham concludes after nearly four years of investigation that the FBI was “too eager” to open a full investigation into Trump and that the agency did so on the basis of limited information that had not been checked. Several agents involved in the investigation privately expressed their distaste for the Republican presidential nominee. Information that could relieve Trump’s employees was not shared with the Justice Department or with the judge who had to rule on investigative powers.
“An objective and fair assessment of these snippets of information should have led the FBI to consider not only whether the ‘Cross Hurricane’ investigation should be opened, but also whether the agency was being manipulated for political or other purposes. Unfortunately, they did not do that,” the report reads.
Durham is not coming forward with new charges – two of which have already ended in acquittal – or with recommendations for other procedures and safeguards at the FBI. That did happen in 2019 after a report from the Inspector General of the Ministry of Justice. Nevertheless, the report was received by former President Trump (and media friends) on Monday as evidence of a “prolonged and insidious charade started by the Democratic Party.”
Some of the allegations the FBI was investigating at the time came from a rattling report requested by the campaign team of Trump’s then-rival, Democrat Hillary Clinton. Durham compares the FBI’s treatment of Trump to a nearly simultaneous investigation into Clinton, who allegedly stored confidential or state secret documents on a private email server in her home. While Clinton’s lawyers did receive a briefing about the investigation from the FBI, Trump and his counsel did not.
Painful
Durham’s investigation was initiated during Trump’s term, by order of his Attorney General William Barr. The assignment was to see if the FBI or “any federal official, employee or anyone else” had broken the law in connection with this investigation. Durham’s answer is no. “Inappropriate or unethical conduct,” he writes, is not the same as a criminal offense under the law.
Still, the report is painful for the FBI and the agency’s then-leaders, Director James Comey and his deputy Andrew McCabe, both fired by Trump. Since the FBI’s search of Trump’s Florida home last year for illegally seized state documents, supporters of the former president have lost all faith in the federal police. Crossfire Hurricane led to the appointment in 2017 of a special counsel, Robert Mueller, who spent years investigating allegations of collaboration between Trump and the Russians.
After a two-and-a-half-year investigation, Mueller could not determine that the Trump campaign “conspired or made agreements with the Russian government over its activities to influence the (US, ed.) Election.” According to Mueller, it would be difficult for a prosecutor to prove that permanent and casual employees of Trump’s campaign team “knowingly broke the law”.