Unsealed documents detail tactics in Clinton email probe

Court documents approved for release in the lead-up to a massive Justice Department watchdog report on the FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton's private email account offer fodder for both critics and defenders of the bureau's work.

The newly unsealed court filings, obtained by POLITICO, may well serve as a Rorschach test about the Clinton email probe. They demonstrate that the FBI's investigation did not rely solely on the voluntary cooperation of those involved, since agents and prosecutors used a combination of search warrants and other court orders to gain evidence relevant to the probe.

At the same time, the records do not contradict complaints by Republicans that the FBI did not use grand jury subpoenas to demand testimony from top Clinton aides, obtain search warrants to gain access to laptops Clintons' lawyers used to review her emails, or seek the personal phones and similar devices used by her top aides.

Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz sought unsealing of the records in May, in order to allow him to publish some details from the filings in his report released in June on alleged misconduct at the FBI and Justice Department prior to the 2016 presidential election.

Nearly 100 pages of filings from federal court in Alexandria, Virginia, show how investigators used a very broad search warrant in September 2015 to gain access to the email account of top Clinton adviser Jake Sullivan. The FBI told a federal magistrate judge that a July 2009 email forwarded to Sullivan's personal Gmail account showed that "top secret" information, including records related to sensitive satellite imagery, likely resided on Google's servers.

More:

https://www.politico.com/blogs/under-the-radar/2018/06/30/unsealed-documents-depict-thoroughness-of-clinton-email-probe-673171

Comey on election: ‘I hope to be forgotten’

The Aspen Daily News ^ | July 1, 2018 | Andre Salvail

Former FBI director James Comey — the man many Americans blame for Donald Trump’s election to the White House, and who the president later fired — doesn’t feel responsible for the outcome of the 2016 presidential election but is burdened by it, he said Saturday in Aspen.

Here are a few highlights from the Couric-Comey interview:

• Couric brought up the recent release of a 500-page report from Horowitz, the Justice Department inspector general, concerning Comey’s actions as head of the FBI during the 2016 campaign. The report said he deviated from departmental policies and engaged in “subjective, ad-hoc decision-making” and that the Oct. 28 letter was “a serious error in judgment.” Comey told Couric that he encouraged the Horowitz report when he was still the FBI director and even after he was fired. “It was painful for a couple of reasons,” he recalled of the day he read it. “It’s a trauma to go back though one of the most painful things I’ve ever been through, as a leader, and it was painful to read yourself being criticized, even though I expected to be criticized.”

• Comey held a news conference on July 15, 2016, announcing that he would not recommend charges against Clinton regarding her use of the private email server, saying “no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case.” However, on that same day, he was critical of Clinton, saying she was “extremely careless” in her handling of the emails. Couric asked Comey whether it was appropriate for him to make the announcement since he wasn’t the attorney general, who usually carries out such duties when investigations are closed. Comey replied that there were two options, “offering transparency separately” or offering it while standing next to the attorney general.

“The one least likely to do lasting damage to the institutions was this bad option [standing alone], not this bad option,” he said. “I’m not picking on Loretta Lynch by saying that there were a number of things that happened that led me to believe … it would be very difficult for [Lynch] to credibly announce the completion of an investigation of one of two candidates for president of the United States, the candidate for the party that” Lynch belonged to as well as President Obama. Comey provided additional background, noting that prior to the announcement, there had been a mini-controversy over Lynch’s private meeting with former President Clinton on an airplane and media conjecture over whether that meeting was related to the email investigation.

• Of his public statement that Clinton had been “extremely careless” with the emails, Couric suggested that Comey placed “a value judgment on her” even though she was not being charged with a crime. Comey said it is part of the norm to say such things about a person’s conduct “when the public interest requires it.” He said he struggled with the wording of the statement. “I wasn’t trying to attack Hillary Clinton, I was trying to be transparent with the American people and describe the conduct.” Clinton, as secretary of state, discussed top-secret information eight times and secret information 50-plus times in emails, Comey said.

“I screwed it up,” he said. “‘Extremely careless’ was a stupid term to use; I should have said ‘really sloppy.’”

More:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/3667637/posts

Republican wins race to replace former congressman Blake Farenthold

Wins special election with 55%, avoiding runoff

Republican Michael Cloud won the special election Saturday to become the next congressman from Texas' 27th district, replacing former congressman Blake Farenthold, who resigned after allegations of sexual harassment.

With 100% of the precincts reporting, Cloud captured nearly 55% of the vote in a crowded field, avoiding a runoff.

He will serve out the remainder of Farenthold's term, which runs through January and is also running for a full two-year term.

Cloud ran as a Christian conservative, and adopted Trump's calls to "drain the swamp" and build a wall along the southern border. He had the endorsement of Republican Gov. Greg Abbott and former congressman Ron Paul, according to The Washington Post.

Farenthold announced in December that he would not seek reelection after news broke he used taxpayer money to pay a settlement of $84,000 to a former aide who accused him of sexual harassment and other improper conduct.

Farenthold denied some of the allegations against him but also apologized using for inappropriate language and for his role in creating a hostile workplace. He resigned from office in April.