Comey: 'I was wrong' to say FISA process was 'followed'
Fox News contributor Kimberly Strassel weighs in.
Fox News contributor Kimberley Strassel rejected former FBI director James Comey’s claim that he was distant from the bureau’s Trump-Russia investigation, saying on Monday that Justice Department Inspector General Michael E. Horowitz’s report concerning the origins of the probe and the issuance of Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrants for former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page lists “all kinds of reasons” that he was involved.
“If you go through the report, there’s all kind of the reasons to wonder about Comey’s claim that he was just very distant from this,” Strassel told Martha MacCallum Monday night on “The Story.” She then listed an example from the report.
“The former attorney general, Loretta Lynch, tells the IG that in the spring of 2016, Comey and [former Deputy Director Andrew] McCabe went out of their way to pull her aside and tell her that the FBI got a tip on Carter Page and that the Russians might be trying to use him for information,” Strassel said.
COMEY ADMITS 'I WAS WRONG' ON FISA CONDUCT, REMAINS DEFIANT ON DOSSIER IN TENSE INTERVIEW
“Why would he know all about that, if he was a guy who was just really distant? So I think this sounds very convenient now that all the facts have come out.”
The 476-page report released last week said investigators found no intentional misconduct or political bias surrounding either the launch of the Trump-Russia investigation or as efforts to seek the controversial FISA warrant to monitor Page in the early stages of the probe.
It also said key officials, including Comey and McCabe, did not act with political bias. The IG report generally found that agents were justified in launching the investigation known as Crossfire Hurricane, as well as investigations into four Trump associates: Page, former Trump campaign foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos, former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort.
Still, Horowitz’s report revealed there were at least 17 "significant inaccuracies and omissions" in the Page FISA applications.
On “Fox News Sunday” Comey admitted that the report showed that he was "overconfident" when he defended his former agency's use of the FISA warrants.
IG HOROWITZ RIPS FBI 'FAILURE IN RUSSIA PROBE, SAYS NOBODY VINDICATED BY REPORT
"He's right, I was wrong," Comey said Sunday about the agency’s handling of surveillance applications for warrants against Page.
"I was overconfident as director in our procedures," he added and said that what happened "was not acceptable."
On Sunday, Comey went on to say that Horowitz “also found things that we were never accused of, which is real sloppiness and that’s concerning.”
He also downplayed the role of former British spy Christopher Steele’s information in obtaining the FISA warrant against Page, claiming that it was "not a huge part of the presentation to the court," just part of the information included in the warrant application.
“Should it surprise anyone that this was how Jim Comey described this report?” Strassel, a member of the Wall Street Journal editorial board, asked on Monday night.
“This is the same guy that for two years assured everyone that no one did anything wrong at the FBI, that all the FISA procedures were followed, that this Steele dossier was not really a central part of the FISA warrant. All incorrect.”
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“So now he comes out and he says ‘sloppiness.’ Of course that’s not what this report was," Strassel added. "This report was the inspector general finding that the FBI had deliberately gone around all of the safeguards that have been set up to protect the civil liberties of the United States, which is as big a violation as it gets when you’re talking about law enforcement.”
Fox News’ Ronn Blitzer contributed to this report.
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