Chaffetz, Comey's Motivation And The Hatch Act

As the rumors and innuendos continue to swirl about what the FBI actually knows about these potentially new emails, the latest line of attack on the Clinton campaign from not only the Trump campaign but also from the press is that Clinton should have Huma Abedin make a statement about the emails in question. On Meet the Press, Chuck Todd asked why Abedin just doesn't give her OK to release the emails and followed with a question about whether the Clinton campaign still has trust in Abedin. This just shows you how far off the rails we have gone because of Comey's ill-advised letter. How is Abedin supposed to say anything relevant since the FBI has even refused to officially confirm that it is her emails the FBI is looking at. As Clinton campaign manager Robbie Mook pointed out, the FBI/Justice Department has not even reached to Abedin to request that permission. So, once again, the Clinton campaign is being forced to respond to a hypothetical as though were established fact.

Meanwhile, George W. Bush's chief ethics lawyer, Richard Painter, has filed an ethics complaint against Comey for violating the Hatch Act. This will mean that Comey will have to answer that famous question from Howard Baker during the Watergate hearings - "What did you know and when did you know it?" Initially, a number of career prosecutors defended Comey by saying that he never would have written a letter like this unless he had some new, concrete evidence. However, subsequent leaks from the FBI and Justice Department seem to indicate that Comey has no idea what is in this new batch of emails. If that truly is the case, combined with his direct violation of DOJ protocols and the recommendations of superiors, he is definitely skirting quite close, if not over, the line of a Hatch Act violation. As Painter points out, "But an official doesn’t need to have a specific intent — or desire — to influence an election to be in violation of the Hatch Act or government ethics rules. The rules are violated if it is obvious that the official’s actions could influence the election, there is no other good reason for taking those actions, and the official is acting under pressure from persons who obviously do want to influence the election."

I personally do not believe that Comey is a political hack. In fact, I think he is almost the opposite - he has an outsized sense of personal integrity. That is what allowed him to oppose the Bush "enhanced interrogation" program.  For me, it is no coincidence that Jason Chaffetz, head of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, all of a sudden changed his tune late last week, saying he would now vote for Trump and promising to continue to investigate Clinton after her election. I believe that Chaffetz had already received word from someone inside the FBI about the existence of these emails and his statements were his warning shot to Comey. Comey realized that the existence of these emails would leak since Chaffetz probably already knew about them and decided to write the letter to protect his own integrity. He did not want to be accused of withholding evidence and protecting Hillary, so he wrote the letter to inoculate himself from those criticisms despite not knowing if there was anything new to be found. The fact that the letter would have an effect on the election and violated DOJ protocols matters less to him than his own sense of integrity. As many other prosecutors have noted, that kind of potential hit to your integrity is the price you have to pay for doing your job. You develop the evidence and make a recommendation to prosecutors and if you develop the evidence in a time frame that makes you look bad, well, that just comes with the territory. But, if what I've described above is true, then it would certainly be a Hatch Act violation as Painter has described.

On Meet the Press, Mike Pence, in his usual most insincere manner, complained about the double standard of justice that applies to the Clintons. And he is absolutely correct - but the double standard holds Clinton to a much higher standard. We don't hear Comey talking about the investigation into alleged Russian hacking; we don't hear about the details of investigations into the Trump Foundation. But we did have the FBI Director characterize the evidence against Hillary Clinton even though there was no indictment recommended. And now we have a letter that impugns Hillary, provides no new evidence, and potentially has a decisive effect on the presidential and down-ballot elections. The irony of the "double standard" comment might almost be humorous if the potential effects weren't so devastating.