Jim Comey’s fateful mistake: What was he thinking?

MORT ZUCKERMAN

November 6, 2016

The self-righteous James Comey has served his country badly. President Obama did not mention Comey by name in a recent interview, but Obama is justified in his criticism. “We don’t operate on incomplete information,” Obama told NowThisNews. “We don’t operate on leaks. We operate based on concrete decisions that are made.”

Comey dropped his stink bomb shortly before the election, and all he could say was that material discovered on the wretched Anthony Wiener’s computer would “appear to be pertinent.” Comey might have paused to reflect on the conclusion of the FBI’s exhaustive examination, that no charges were warranted against Clinton or her aides.

Comey’s July report was unsparing in laying out the facts contained in thousands of emails. He was right in declaring that the investigation was done “competently, honestly and independently. No outside influence of any kind was brought to bear.”

There was indeed plenty of evidence of potential violations of the statutes on the handling of classified information, but his best judgment was that “no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case. Prosecutors necessarily weigh a number of factors before bringing charges. There are obvious considerations, like the strength of the evidence, especially regarding intent. Responsible decisions also consider the context of a person’s actions, and how similar situations have been handled in the past.”

But now the curious situation arises that Comey seems not to have remembered his doctrine of intent. By his own admission, he does not know whether Clinton is identified in these further emails, or what they say. Did he give any thought to what people less scrupulous about the evidence might do with the innuendo he has perpetrated?

Immediately, Donald Trump went on the warpath, with attacks presuming the very worst of what might be found in emails on Weiner’s computer.

Trump said that “This is bigger than Watergate.” He’d like to lock up his opponent because, he shouts, her “criminal action was willful, deliberate, intentional and purposeful” — exactly the charges for which the FBI found no evidence.

Trump is a compulsive liar and cheat. He creates paranoid fantasies for his massive rallies of Trumpkins, fired up on grievances, real and imagined.

When Trump lies are raised with his supporters, a common reaction is simply to say, “He tells it like it is.” Fact-checkers have reported that the vast proportion of Trump statements are exactly like it isn’t, wasn’t or will be.

Comey seems oblivious of the effect of handing Trump a piece of dynamite. How far, as a servant of the law and a federal officer, did the FBI director weigh his obligations under the Hatch Act of 1939? Its full title is An Act to Prevent Pernicious Political Activities, and “pernicious political activity” bears a close resemblance to what Comey has done.

He has earned rebukes from all sides of the political spectrum for his precipitate invitation to make a mad election even crazier. Former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who was in the George W. Bush administration, says, “You don’t comment on investigations, because commenting on the investigation may jeopardize the investigation. And that’s the box he’s put himself in.”

Richard Painter, the chief White House ethics lawyer in George W. Bush’s administration from 2005 to 2007, has filed an official complaint with both the Office of Special Counsel and the Office of Government Ethics. He charges that Comey’s act at this time is “an abuse of power.”

Comey makes it clear he felt he had a duty to keep the lawmakers and those making noise from the Trump campaign up to date on his investigation. He didn’t.

“He never should have promised Congress that he would give them updates with respect to Secretary Clinton, when he doesn’t do that with respect to anybody else, when it’s clear that the only reason they want the information is politics,” Painter told NPR.

Comey is accused of a double standard, since there has been enough evidence of Russian interference with the election, actually invited by Trump, for Comey to tell us where he is on that subject, too. How about early next week? Comey’s resignation will not undo the damage. It is too late for that. But a resignation would honor the integral role of law in the American process of democracy.