James Comey Did Not Follow FBI Rules in Hillary Clinton Investigation

Bloomberg reported on Thursday that the results of an internal investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice indicate that James Comey, the former FBI director, did not adhere to the usual protocols of the agency during the investigation into Hillary Clinton, but there is no evidence to suggest that Mr. Comey had political motivations during this investigation, which took place before the 2016 presidential election. The Bloomberg report, published on Thursday and part of Michael Horowitz's report, the Inspector General of the Department of Justice, states: "While we believe that those decisions were not driven by political bias from James Comey, we have concluded that by not following the rules of the FBI and the Department of Justice, his actions negatively impacted the reputation of the FBI and the Department of Justice as fair enforcers of justice." This investigation is the final result of inquiries that began a week before Donald Trump's presidency in January 2017, with the full text released on Thursday evening. The main subject of the investigation was whether Mr. Comey's comments regarding the investigation into Mrs. Clinton's use of a personal server for emails while she was Secretary of State were based on "improper considerations." Reuters recalls that James Comey explained in a rare press conference in July 2016 why the FBI would not prosecute Mrs. Clinton. He criticized Mrs. Clinton for using personal emails for official State Department business, stating that she had been "extremely careless," but that this was not sufficient to charge her with federal crimes. At that time, Republicans criticized Mr. Comey's statements, claiming they could bolster Mrs. Clinton's position in the election. However, in October 2016, less than two weeks before the presidential election, James Comey wrote a formal letter to Congress members stating that the investigation had been reopened after new emails were discovered on the computer of the husband of one of Mrs. Clinton's senior advisors. Since then, Mrs. Clinton has repeatedly stated that Mr. Comey's letter to Congress impacted her defeat against Donald Trump. Two days before the November 8 election, James Comey announced that he had found no evidence to charge Mrs. Clinton in the new emails. Meanwhile, the Inspector General of the Department of Justice is investigating the potential leak of information from the FBI in its investigation of the Clinton Foundation aimed at aiding Donald Trump's campaign. U.S. law enforcement and judicial agencies had previously told Reuters that this information had been passed to Rudy Giuliani, the former mayor of New York and one of Donald Trump's advisors. Mr. Giuliani is now the president's lawyer in the investigation regarding potential collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign. The investigation is also examining the actions of two senior FBI employees named Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, who have been accused of political bias by Republicans for exchanging "offensive text messages" about Donald Trump. These two employees participated in the investigations related to Clinton and the cases concerning Russian interference in the elections. However, after the messages were revealed, Robert Mueller, the special counsel for the Russia investigation, removed Peter Strzok from his team.