Former FBI Director James Comey has been indicted on one count of making false statements and one count of obstruction of justice.
The charges were brought after the Trump administration replaced the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, Erik Siebert, with White House aide Lindsey Halligan, who sought an immediate indictment from the grand jury before the statute of limitations could expire next Tuesday.
Without mentioning Comey by name, Attorney General Pam Bondi declared in a post on X that the indictment serves to prove “no one is above the law.”
“No one is above the law. Today’s indictment reflects this Department of Justice’s commitment to holding those who abuse positions of power accountable for misleading the American people. We will follow the facts in this case,” she said.
According to NBC News, the charges likely “stem from testimony Comey gave on Sept. 30, 2020, during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing.
“Asked by Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, about testimony he gave in 2017 asserting that he did not authorize leaking information regarding the FBI’s investigations into President Donald Trump or former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Comey said, ‘I stand by the testimony,’” noted NBC News.
“Comey’s deputy, Andrew McCabe, has said that Comey authorized him to leak information to the press, according to a 2018 Justice Department inspector general’s report. But the report also found that McCabe made multiple false or misleading statements,” it added.
In July, the FBI launched an investigation into former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director John Brennan and former FBI Director James Comey over their roles in the investigation surrounding President Donald Trump and Russia’s alleged collusion.
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