FBI Director Comey has a history with the Clintons

[TheDormouse]

Comey’s first brush with them (Bill & Hillary Clinton) came when Bill Clinton was president. Looking to get back into government after a stint in private practice, Comey signed on as deputy special counsel to the Senate Whitewater Committee. In 1996, after months of work, Comey came to some damning conclusions: Hillary Clinton was personally involved in mishandling documents and had ordered others to block investigators as they pursued their case. Worse, her behavior fit into a pattern of concealment: she and her husband had tried to hide their roles in two other matters under investigation by law enforcement. Taken together, the interference by White House officials, which included destruction of documents, amounted to “far more than just aggressive lawyering or political naiveté,” Comey and his fellow investigators concluded. It constituted “a highly improper pattern of deliberate misconduct.”

Comey parlayed the Whitewater job into top posts in Virginia and New York, returning to Manhattan in 2002 to be the top federal prosecutor there. One of his first cases as a line attorney in the same office 15 years earlier had been the successful prosecution of Marc Rich, a wealthy international financier, for tax evasion. But on his last day as President in 2001, Bill Clinton pardoned Rich. “I was stunned,” Comey later told Congress. As top U.S. prosecutor in New York in 2002, appointed by George W. Bush, Comey inherited the criminal probe into the Rich pardon and 175 others Clinton had made at the 11th hour.

http://time.com/4276988/jim-comey-hillary-clinton/

June 21, 2002

The Justice Department yesterday declined to file charges in one of the more unusual cases of pardons and commutations issued by President Bill Clinton in his final days in office: allegations that the former president granted clemency to four Hasidic Jews after their tiny New York state community voted almost unanimously for Hillary Rodham Clinton in the 2000 senatorial race.

After months of silence on the matter, United States Attorney James B. Comey in Manhattan, who is overseeing investigations of 176 pardons and commutations granted in the final days of Clinton's presidency, said probes of the other cases would continue....

Comey declined to elaborate on other cases, but among the most publicized pardons was the one Clinton gave to fugitive commodities trader Marc Rich. Rich's ex-wife, Denise, was a major donor to the Democratic National Committee, Hillary Clinton's campaign and the Clinton library foundation.

Other pardons under investigation include those granted to two clients of Hillary Clinton's brother, Hugh Rodham, who received $400,000 in payments for representing them. Bill Clinton's brother, Roger, also was named in a recent House committee report for "a systematic effort to trade on his brother's name" in lobbying for pardons.

The pardon investigation began with considerable fanfare shortly after Bill Clinton's spate of last-minute legal forgiveness came to light. But it slowed after Sept. 11 (2001), when the New York FBI and U.S. attorney's offices became focused almost exclusively on the war on terrorism....

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2002/06/21/clinton-cleared-in-new-square-pardon-case/5a4d8f1d-4f69-494f-904c-0e6c2b689baa/

[Peace Patriot]

1. Clinton should've pardoned all the small time marijuana convicts...

...instead of wealthy donors to the "Clinton library" (which became the Clinton Foundation--a multi-billion dollar Clinton slush fund).

It would have been FA-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-R more just!

And I hope Bernie Sanders does it, after he removes MJ from the dangerous substances act.

[jmg257]

2. So does Loretta Lynch. nt

[TheDormouse]

4. Do tell. I don't know anything about it. Details?

[jmg257]

5. Please do a google search...will not post about Democrats and their ties that may

cause questionable decisions.

Cheers!

[Holly_Hobby]

13. Conflict of Interest n/t

[cosmicone]

3. Massive corruption conspiracy !!!!

[ChairmanAgnostic]

10. Naïveté ! ! ! How quaint!

Almost refreshing, really.

But, not.

[amborin]

6. this is major!

[amborin]

7. more here on the pardons:

Edmonton Journal (Alberta)

January 28, 2001 Sunday Final Edition

Scandal creeps up on Hillary Clinton: Pardons for four Hasidic convicts linked to supporters

Daily Telegraph James Langton

Hillary Clinton was forced to lie low this weekend amid a growing storm over allegations that her campaign "bought" Jewish votes in exchange for a White House pardon for four Hasidic men convicted of fraud.


The former First Lady, now a United States Senator, abruptly cancelled a series of public appearances as details began to emerge of the deal struck on the last day of the Clinton presidency.

She captured almost 100 per cent of the votes in the Hasidic community of New Square, 32 km outside of New York, though neighbouring areas went strongly for Rick Lazio, her Republican opponent.

Clinton was given an enthusiastic reception at New Square during the Senate race last summer, with promises that a street would be named in her honour. Republican campaigning in the village stopped after it became clear that the 1,500 votes were locked up for the First Lady.

It emerged last week that representatives for the four men, who were convicted in 1998 of a $40-million swindle in which government funds were channelled into a non-existent religious school, met the Clintons in Washington only weeks before the inauguration of President George W. Bush.

Their names were subsequently added to a list of nearly 200 pardons and sentence commutations released by President Clinton.

The four Hasidic men, serving prison sentences of 30 months to seven years, had their jail terms cut by up to two-thirds. They claimed that the money was used to fund other community projects.

snip

On Jan 16, a member of the prosecution team wrote to the president, saying that a pardon would "send a message to the worldwide community that its pursuit of its own religious customs justified fraud against the government."



The New York Times February 1, 2001 Thursday


The Senator Doth Protest Too Little By JOYCE PURNICK

snip

questions she was asked concerned the pardons, gifts and commutations. She had ample opportunity to thunder or at least show some indignation.

She could have seized the chance to send a strong message that she is not for sale and that nobody had dare get the wrong impression. She did not. She was cool, steely, contained. Her legalistic answers were reminiscent of her husband's infamously careful parsing of language when he was accused of infidelity. ("There is not a sexual relationship" -- emphasis added.)

The senator showed no anger, deflected questions with studied calm, never once drew herself up and said, "I don't make deals and I never will." Instead, Mrs. Clinton denied a connection between that White House meeting and the subsequent commutations of the Hasidic men, said she had no opinion about her husband's decisions, delivered a civics lecture about the powers of the executive branch and referred reporters to Mr. Clinton's transition office.

Asked about the Rich pardon and the reduced sentences of the Hasidic men, who were convicted of inventing a fictitious religious school to attract millions of dollars in government aid, she said: "I have no opinion. I had no opinion before, I had no opinion at the time, and I have no opinion now."

But, persisted a reporter, what about the perception of a quid pro quo?

Said the new senator: "I have to say, I've been around politics for so many years. I have no way of even guessing, let alone controlling, what anyone will say or think. I can only do the best job I can, and that's what I intend to do. There wasn't any connection and, you know, people will have to make their own judgments about it."

They have.

[notadmblnd]

8. kick

[azmom]

9. Kick

[IdaBriggs]

12. I had some concerns early on when I first read about that BUT

It turns out he is a "law and order" guy with a "won't back down" attitude regardless of politics.

He took out Scooter Libby and Martha Stewart.

He has an impeccable reputation for being categorically honest, very detailed and won't let his stuff be used for political gamesmanship.

If he says to indict, it happens. If he says there isn't enough there, he won't do it.

He holds fiercely to being "independent" and won't let his office be used as a political weapon.

That is what I read anyway, so I have decided to trust his call on the Hillary situation.

[TheDormouse]

14. lemme just throw this out there then

Would Comey rather be FBI director or attorney general?

On the one hand, he could probably stay FBI director just about as long as he chooses, whereas attorney general won't last longer than an individual president's term in office.

On the other hand, the attorney general is the FBI director's boss and has his/her hands in a lot more pots.

Comey probably stands zero chance of getting appointed attorney general if Clinton gets into the White House. But he might have a shot if someone else wins, like Kasich or ?Trump.

[JackRiddler]

15. Fuck. Whitewater? Really?

And people here think the FBI isn't going to move on this? And they think it's good news that Comey says it won't happen before the D concention? Jaysus!

And a Bush appointee, then appointed upwards by Obama.

Fuck!