The Justice Department’s internal watchdog reportedly has sent a criminal referral for fired FBI official Andrew McCabe to the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington.
The move follows a recent DOJ inspector general report that found McCabe leaked a self-serving story to the press and later lied about it to then-Director James Comey and federal investigators, prompting Attorney General Jeff Sessions to fire him on March 16.
Link Source (Fox News) :
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...eferral-for-mccabe-to-federal-prosecutor.html
Link Source (Washington Post) :
https://www.washingtonpost.com/worl...6fda6b404c7_story.html?utm_term=.a42857ead27b
Link Source (The Hill) :
http://thehill.com/policy/national-...inspector-general-issues-criminal-referral-of
The Washington Post reported that the IG referred the finding that McCabe misled investigators to the top federal prosecutor in D.C. to examine whether he should be charged.
Representatives with the Justice Department, inspector general’s office and U.S. attorney’s office all declined to comment.
Republican Rep. Mark Meadows backed the move in a tweet Thursday afternoon.
"The criminal referral from the IG is the right decision. It's about time we have some accountability for this type of conduct at the Justice Department," he said.
On Wednesday, Comey also publicly acknowledged he was the one who prompted the probe and seemed to back the investigation’s findings.
The fired FBI director addressed his former colleague's controversies during an appearance on ABC’s “The View,” after being pressed on how the public was supposed to have “confidence” in the bureau after revelations that ex-deputy director McCabe lied about the leak.
“It’s not okay. The McCabe case illustrates what an organization committed to the truth looks like,” Comey said. “I ordered that investigation.”
Comey seemed to defend McCabe's character even while backing the DOJ inspector general probe's findings.
“Good people lie. I think I’m a good person, where I have lied,” Comey said. “I still believe Andrew McCabe is a good person but the inspector general found he lied.”
Comey added that there are “severe consequences” within the Justice Department and the FBI for those who lie.
While Comey may not have intentionally launched the investigation gunning for McCabe, it was spurred by a desire to find who leaked to The Wall Street Journal in October 2016 about an FBI probe of the Clinton Foundation. The story said a senior Justice Department official expressed displeasure to McCabe that FBI agents were still looking into the Clinton Foundation, and McCabe had defended agents' authority to pursue the issue.
That leak confirmed the existence of the probe into the Clinton Foundation, which Comey, who led the bureau at the time, refused to do.
Horowitz’s report said McCabe authorized the leak and then misled investigators about it, leaking in a way that did not fall under the “public interest” exception.
Horowitz found that McCabe lacked “candor” when questioned by FBI agents on multiple occasions, and that he told agents he did not authorize the disclosure and did not know who was responsible.
But McCabe’s legal counsel, Michael Bromwich, has blasted the inspector general report and has criticized Comey. The report said Comey and McCabe gave conflicting accounts about a conversation they had on the leak.
“The OIG should credit Mr. McCabe’s account over Director Comey’s,” Bromwich wrote to Horowitz in a letter, complaining that the report “paints Director Comey as a white knight carefully guarding FBI information, while overlooking that Mr. McCabe’s account is more credible…”
He issued a similar statement Wednesday in response to Comey's interview comments:
"In his comments this week about the McCabe matter, former FBI Director James Comey has relied on the accuracy and the soundness of the Office of the Inspector General's (OIG) conclusions in their report on Mr. McCabe. In fact, the report fails to adequately address the evidence (including sworn testimony) and documents that prove that Mr. McCabe advised Director Comey repeatedly that he was working with the
Wall Street Journal on the stories in question prior to publication. Neither Mr. Comey nor the OIG is infallible, and in this case neither of them has it right."
