Comey Testimony Begins with Lindsey Graham Pressing Him on Steele Dossier: 'A Bunch of Crap'
Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham pressed former FBI Director James Comey on the Steele Dossier, calling it “a bunch of crap” during Wednesday’s Senate hearing.
Comey appeared in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee to defend the bureau’s investigation into ties between Russia and the Trump campaign, known as “Crossfire Hurricane.”
Graham asked Comey about an investigative referral that had been forwarded to Comey and Peter Strzok about then-Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s approval of a plan to look into Trump’s campaign as “a means of distracting the public from her use of a public email server.”
Comey responded that it “doesn’t ring a bell.”
The South Carolina senator said that it was “pretty stunning” Comey didn’t remember it.
“You get this inquiry from the intelligence community to look at the Clinton campaign basically trying to create a distraction accusing Trump of being a Russian agent … to distract from her email server problems,” Graham said.
“How far fetched is that, Mr. Comey, when we now know that the Democratic Party through Fusion GPS hired Christopher Steele, a foreign agent who had a very strong bias against Donald Trump, who hired a Russian sub source who the FBI believed to be a Russian spy to compile a dossier that was a bunch of crap to be used against an American citizen working for the Trump campaign.
“You already knew that, it seems to me that you would want to investigate other allegations, but you’re telling me you don’t recall this.”
“It did come to you:” Sen. Lindsey Graham calls out James Comey for receiving “investigative referral” on Clinton campaign trying to distract from the email probehttps://t.co/I2LPsBSo4s pic.twitter.com/Je7g6cp6Zx
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) September 30, 2020
Comey had approved of the launch of “Crossfire Hurricane” but was fired in May 2017 over the FBI’s Russia probe, ABC News reported.
The investigation ultimately led to the probe of former special counsel Robert Mueller, which determined there was no collusion.
Since then, the Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz has found that the Crossfire Hurricane probe was riddled with misconduct.
Appearing via video Wednesday, Comey said, “Overall, I’m proud of the work.”
“In the main, it was done by the book, it was appropriate and it was essential that it be done,” he said.
“There are parts of it that are concerning, but overall, I’m proud of the work.”
Comey is the third Russia investigation official to testify before the committee, following former deputy attorney generals Sally Yates and Rod Rosenstein, according to The Washington Post.
Democrats have criticized the inquiry led by Graham, saying he is politically motivated to undermine the probe so close to the 2020 election.
“We’re going back on a trip down memory lane to four years ago, to decide whether certain documents were handled properly and I will concede the fact that some were not,” Democratic Sen. Richard Durbin of Illinois said.
“Let’s be honest: if we were doing our job, we would be talking about the 2020 election.”
Graham defended his investigation to Fox News in June.
“We’re not going to let the system blame some low-level intel analyst or case agent for defrauding the court,” he said.
“I believe it goes to the very top, and I’m going to get to the bottom of it and that means Sally Yates and [Rod] Rosenstein, and [Andrew] McCabe and Comey are all going to come before the committee and they’re going to be asked, ‘What did you know and when did you know it?’”
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