James A. Gagliano:
“…Setting aside valid arguments that the FBI acted inappropriately — treating the Trump White House differently than they would have treated Bush’s or Obama’s, as the hubristic Comey proudly admits — Powell’s charges of egregious government misconduct are certainly deserving of the court’s consideration. The withholding of clearly exculpatory material related to revelations that “important substantive changes were made to the Flynn 302” may well be central to the findings of Inspector General Michael Horowitz and Durham, as well.
Here’s me, acknowledging my mistake. I was dead wrong. It now seems there was a concerted effort, though isolated, within the upper-echelons of the FBI to influence the outcome of the Flynn investigation. By “dirtying up” Flynn, Comey’s FBI headquarters team of callow sycophants shortcut the investigative process. Arm-twisting Flynn through the “tweaked” version of his interview afforded him criminal exposure. The cocksure Comey team felt supremely confident that would inspire him “flipping” and give them the desperately sought-after evidence of Trump-Russia collusion that the wholly unverified Steele dossier was never remotely capable of providing.
I am physically nauseous as I type these words. I have long maintained that innocent mistakes were made and that the investigators at the center of this maelstrom were entitled to the benefit of the doubt.
No more.
They have tarnished the badge and forever stained an agency that deserved so much better from them. I am ashamed. The irreparable damage Comey’s team has done to the FBI will take a generation to reverse…”