Trump DOJ Indicts James Comey: Reactions, Evaluation, Updates

Former federal prosecutor Elie Honig weighs in:

Let’s begin with the indictment itself, and no matter little could be discerned from it. We’ve acquired two counts — the grand jury reportedly rejected a 3rd — each based mostly on Comey’s testimony to the Senate in September 2020. Rely one alleges that Comey testified falsely and rely two fees that, by giving that false testimony, he obstructed a congressional continuing. In keeping with the indictment, Comey testified that he had not approved anybody else on the FBI to leak data to the media, when in actual fact he had finished so.

And that … is it. The entire charging doc runs lower than two full pages, and the core allegations take up only a couple dozen phrases. The very function of an indictment is to inform a defendant of the fees in opposition to him, with affordable specificity. A lot for that quaint notion.

Whereas he doesn’t suppose this payback prosecution has a lot probability of success, it nonetheless “marks a darkish flip”:

Look ahead to Comey’s staff to maneuver shortly to dismiss the indictment based mostly on a declare of selective prosecution. They’ll argue, in essence, that he was singled out for prosecution for political or different improper functions. Defendants typically increase this declare however hardly ever win. The issue is that it’s usually tough or unattainable to show that the federal government had some impermissible motive; conversations about focusing on are likely to occur in hushed tones behind closed doorways, if in any respect.

However that’s not how Donald Trump operates. For this president, the whole lot is broadcast to the world, stay and unfiltered, over social media. Accordingly, Trump already has given Comey exhibit A in his forthcoming movement to dismiss: a September 20 Reality Social submit by which the president brazenly exhorted his lawyer normal (“Pam;,” the missive opens) to indict Comey and different favourite targets for political retribution. “What about Comey, Adam ‘Shifty’ Schiff, Leticia???” the president wrote. “They’re all responsible as hell, however nothing goes to be finished.” After some stream-of-consciousness rambling, Trump ended his diatribe with an instruction to his Justice Division: “JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!! President DJT.” It’s tough to think about a extra simple case of selective prosecution. Don’t be shocked if a decide throws this mess out earlier than it ever reaches a jury.

This prosecution marks a darkish flip. Throughout his first time period, Trump was filled with public bluster, brazenly pining for legal prosecutions of Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, John Kerry, and, sure, Jim Comey. Nevertheless it was all chatter, again then; DoJ and different leaders largely ignored the president’s rants and waited for the tempest to cross.

However now the fanciful discuss has develop into motion, and Comey — as soon as a revered federal prosecutor who took down worldwide terrorists and New York gangsters — will discover himself sitting at a defendant’s desk and dealing with the prospect of his personal imprisonment. Unlikely as plainly Comey will get convicted and sentenced to jail, no one can afford to be nonchalant a couple of federal indictment filed by prosecutors representing america of America.

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