Ex-FBI deputy director McCabe will reportedly be criticized for approving Clinton probe media leak
Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe/Wikimedia Commons.
A report being prepared by the Justice Department’s inspector general is reportedly expected to say that former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe authorized bureau officials to leak information to the Wall Street Journal about an investigation involving the Clinton Foundation.
Michael Horowitz is expected to issue the report in his investigation of how the FBI and Justice Department handled the probe of Hillary Clinton’s use of a private server for emails when she was secretary of state, report the New York Times and the Washington Post. Both stories are based on anonymous sources.
Though high-level government officials often give background briefings to reporters, law enforcement officials generally do not reveal ongoing criminal investigations. Horowitz is expected to criticize McCabe for the revelation.
One source told the Post that the report will also accuse McCabe of misleading investigators about his actions, though McCabe reportedly asserts there was no intent to mislead.
The Wall Street Journal story, published in October 2016, reported on disagreement in the FBI and Justice Department over the handling of the Clinton Foundation probe amid DOJ concerns about the strength of the evidence.
The report told of McCabe standing up to the Justice Department when it expressed concern about pursing the Clinton Foundation probe during the election season. Sources told the Journal that McCabe told a Justice Department official, “Are you telling me that I need to shut down a validly predicated investigation?” Other sources told the Journal, however, that lower-level FBI agents believed McCabe had issued an order for them to “stand down.”
McCabe was briefly acting director of the FBI after President Donald Trump fired James Comey last May. Trump has criticized McCabe because his wife received political donations from a Democratic-linked political action committee when she ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate. McCabe abruptly resigned in January, reportedly after FBI director Chris Wray raised concerns about the upcoming inspector general report.
The political action committee was run by then-Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, a Clinton ally who had previously served the Clinton Foundation.
McCabe had worked on the Clinton investigation and on a probe into Russian influence in the election.
The inspector general’s report could give Trump more ammunition to criticize the FBI, according to the Times. A report that questions the judgment of agents who worked on the Russia and Clinton investigations “would give fodder for Mr. Trump and his supporters to step up their attacks on the FBI,” the newspaper says.
