NEW YORK – FBI Director James Comey’s announcement Tuesday that his agency will not seek prosecution of Hillary Clinton for her mishandling of classified information will only ensure that investigations will continue and additional questions will be raised.
That’s the conclusion of two legal experts who have followed closely the FBI investigation, former U.S. Attorney Joseph di Genova and Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.
The two believe Clinton will not be exonerated in the court of public opinion and that the perception that she received politically motivated preferential treatment from a Democratic administration will dog her for the remainder of the presidential campaign.
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‘Frankly, there’s a disconnect’
Fitton, noting Judicial Watch helped break open the Clinton email scandal, said his organization will “independently continue its groundbreaking litigation and investigation.”
Fitton said Comey’s statement Tuesday morning was incongruous: The FBI director initially made the case that Clinton was grossly negligent in the handling of her private email system, but then he insisted no reasonable prosecutor would take the case, because Clinton did not intend to harm the United States.
“Frankly, there’s a disconnect between Comey’s devastating findings and his weak recommendation not to prosecute Hillary Clinton,” Fitton said.
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“Federal prosecutors, independent of politics, need to consider whether to pursue the potential violations of law confirmed by the FBI.”
‘Reasonable prosecutor would have brought charges’
DiGenova agreed that Comey’s press conference did not make sense, taking into consideration the legal statutes making gross negligence a crime in the handling of highly classified national security information.
“FBI Director James Comey’s press conference was bizarre, an exercise in cognitive dissonance,” diGenova told WND.
“First, Comey sets up the facts for prosecution under gross negligence statutes, then he argues there was no intent. That’s nonsense.”
DiGenova insisted the ultimate consequence of Comey’s press conference today is that Clinton’s email scandal will never go away.
“Mrs. Clinton set up a private server and then followed it up with a series of private servers in her residence that were clearly designed to prevent people from gaining information about activities,” he said. “And knowing that it was inevitable that classified information would be compromised because the devices were not secure.”
He strongly disagreed with Comey that no reasonable prosecutor would file charges in the Clinton email case.
“The conclusion that Director Comey realized in the end was absurd,” diGenova said. “Comey said that no reasonable prosecutor would bring charges based on these facts. I vehemently disagree with that.
“Underlying facts argued persuasively for charges to be filed, even if they were only misdemeanors,” he said. “It was clear that the statutory standard of gross negligence had been met, as well as the greater standard defined by ‘extremely careless.’”
He continued: “It seems to me a reasonable prosecutor would bring charges given not only the facts we knew before that Comey affirmed, but the new facts Comey made public, including that Hillary Clinton had not one private email server, but multiple private servers and the obvious potential compromise of highly classified information as a result of that.”
‘Sad day for rule of law’
DiGenova found “a little cute by half” the sequence of events, beginning with former President Bill Clinton’s meeting on an airport tarmac with Attorney General Loretta Lynch last Friday, ending today with President Obama flying Clinton in Air Force One to North Carolina for their first campaign appearance together
“It is inconceivable to me, given the facts and circumstances, that the White House did not know in advance that Comey had reached a decision not to prosecute,” he insisted.
“It may very well be, as Mr. Comey suggested, that the White House and no one else in the government knew what he was going to say – maybe not the precise words he was going to use in the press conference.
“But certainly the White House knew the conclusion,” he continued. “I can’t believe that President Obama would meet with Mrs. Clinton on Air Force One and fly her to a campaign event in North Carolina without knowing in advance what was going to happen in Director Comey’s press announcement.”
Asked about the Clinton Foundation, diGenova said he had to believe that by not mentioning the issue, Comey meant to close any inquiry into the possibility Clinton used her private email system to coordinate her State Department “official acts” with efforts made by the Clinton Foundation to solicit donations.
“I was especially surprised that Director Comey did not take questions from the press,” diGenova commented. “It’s almost as if he knew how bad his decision was and didn’t want to respond to inquiry.”
DiGenova stressed his conclusion that Comey’s decision not to recommend prosecution “smacks of an accommodation for the ruling class that is absolutely outrageous.”
He said several times that Comey’s decision was a “sad day for law enforcement in the United States and for the rule of law.”
