Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA), the ranking member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, told Breitbart News in an exclusive interview on Sunday evening that the Department of Justice (DOJ) Inspector General (IG) report on former FBI director James Comey, and the DOJ’s decision not to press charge, does not mean he is out of the woods.
Nunes said that Comey, who President Donald Trump fired as FBI director in the first few months of his presidency sparking the launch of the now-completed Special Counsel investigation, could still face charges on a criminal conspiracy from the U.S. Attorney in Connecticut.
Last week, the DOJ’s IG admonished Comey for preparing memos containing classified information, then leaking them to create a desired outcome—something that ended up costing the taxpayers millions of dollars with Robert Mueller’s Special Counsel probe which ultimately found no collusion between President Trump and his campaign with Russian efforts to interfere in the 2016 election. Mueller’s probe also found no evidence of obstruction of justice by President Trump. But even though Comey’s actions were sharply criticized by the IG, the DOJ decided not to prosecute him on the leaks and IG findings. Comey gloated in response, asking publicly for an apology from those who have suggested he may have committed crimes in his actions against the president.
But that gloating from Comey may be premature. Nunes said in his exclusive interview on Breitbart News Sunday on SiriusXM 125 the Patriot Channel that despite the DOJ’s decision not to bring charges against Comey now, if the U.S. Attorney in Connecticut—who has been charged with investigating the origins of the Russia hoax investigation—follows a criminal referral made by House Intelligence Committee Republicans on the lines of a criminal conspiracy, Comey could face charges in that lane.
“I always remind people that the Inspector General does not have a lot of power because they cannot—they don’t have subpoena power,” Nunes said. “They can only interview people who work for the actual agency, unless people will voluntarily be interviewed, which is not likely. So, I think the Inspector General did us a favor here because the House Intelligence Committee Republicans—we sent over referrals to the Department of Justice based on conspiracy. So now there is no question, one thing the Inspector General made clear by all the interviews and evidence that he gathered is that Comey is definitely part of the conspiracy.”
Nunes continued by noting that Comey was not cooperative with congressional investigators digging into his leaking.
“You know, when Comey came before the Congress last year when Republicans controlled it, he refused to answer,” Nunes said. “For a guy that pontificates on Twitter and that wrote a book and goes on the news quite often, quite frequently, when it got behind closed doors and he had to tell the truth, his number one answer was, ‘Oh, I just don’t remember that’ or ‘I don’t recall.’”
Nunes then said that Comey, thanks to the IG’s findings, is “eligible for a larger conspiracy charge” and said that “we need real charges brought.” He said the place to watch for such potential charges against Comey or others to come from is the U.S. Attorney from Connecticut.
“So this is a guy who is definitely not telling the truth, and the good thing about the IG report is he’s now made himself, the IG has now made him eligible for a larger conspiracy charge—a criminal conspiracy charge—which is what we really hope the attorney general [U.S. attorney] out of Connecticut is able to do,” Nunes said. “That’s the big thing that we need. We need real charges brought. And I think a lot of people are frustrated because they feel like Comey leaked classified information. But the question is would a panel of jurors in Washington, D.C., [convict]? There would be so much ambiguity because he claims—I forget the exact numbers, but like 1, 4, and 7 contained classified information but those weren’t the memos that he gave to his professor friend that went to the media. It would be almost impossible to prove and he would probably skate. And probably the worst thing to happen would be for him to skate. So I think that in the end, the Attorney General made the right decision as long as they continue to press on the larger issue which is: How did this whole investigation begin in the first place with zero evidence, zero evidence that Trump had any involvement with Russia?”
When asked in a follow-up if this means he expects the U.S. Attorney from Connecticut to bring criminal conspiracy charges against Comey or others, Nunes said he is not sure what the U.S. Attorney will do. But he did say “the evidence is there” for criminal conspiracy charges against the former FBI director and others involved in fabricating the Russia hoax.
“I’ve been very careful,” Nunes said. “I shouldn’t be this way, but I like to give people the benefit of the doubt and I like to not name names until there’s been a fair process and we’ve given the U.S. Attorney time to do his work. However, with that said, the one thing that is clear is if the U.S. Attorney decides to take our complaint—I’m not saying he’s going to do exactly what we’ve asked him to do but he’s clearly looking at all this. If he looks at conspiracy, on the FISA courts and the manipulation of intelligence for political purposes, it is now impossible—there is so much evidence that puts Comey right in the middle of this—so that’s my point. If they’re going to go down that road, Comey has got to be involved in it. The evidence is there.”
LISTEN TO REP. DEVIN NUNES ON BREITBART NEWS SUNDAY:
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