Just the News: James Comey Got His "Friend" Hired by the Government and Given a Top Secret Clearance So That Comey Could Leak to Him and Have Him Leak to Reporters

Actually, that much, I think, was already known. But it's hard to write a headline about the new stuff.

John Solomon and Jerry Dunleavy:

Comey's media mole told FBI he shaped Russia narrative, needed 'discount' to deny leaking intel

The FBI confirmed illegal intel leaks but rounded up no offenders. Declassified memos have unmasked Comey's secret media conduit, a law professor whom Comey put on the government payroll.

Let me explain the "discount:" he told federal investigators that he could not recall leaking top secret/SCI intelligence to reporters, but said he needed a "discount" for that assertion.

In other words, with one breath he denies that he's a traitor who illegally passed US top secret intelligence for partisan political purposes, and then, with the last of that same breath, says "Oh but actually I might have, so you can't prosecute me for perjury."

See? Try writing a headline for that.

The FBI concluded numerous legacy news media stories that crafted the false Russia collusion narrative contained illegally leaked classified intelligence but failed to definitively identify the leakers. But agents did force a stunning admission that ex-FBI Director James Comey used a special conduit to the Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times in his bid to polish his image and push for a special prosecutor to take down President Donald Trump.

Columbia University law professor Daniel Richman admitted to agents in interviews he routinely communicated on behalf of Comey, his longtime friend, with Times reporter Michael Schmidt, whose work was among the newspaper's 2018 Pulitzer-winning stories on Russian election interference. The goal, Richman told the FBI, was "to correct stories critical of Comey, the FBI and to shape future press coverage" outside of the bureau's official press office, according to internal FBI memos that current Director Kash Patel delivered to Congress this week.

While Richman was known to have been publicly quoted in news stories as an advocate for Comey, he admitted to agents -- who were part of the FBI's Arctic Haze classified leaks inquiry -- that he was given access by Comey to what turned out to be highly classified information up to the SCI level and sometimes provided information to reporters on an anonymous basis.

SCI stands for sensitive compartmentalized information. This is called "codeword" intelligence, where there's a codeword that is itself top secret for the category of information, and only a small number of people are "read into" the list of people authorized to receive it.

In other words, this is real secret information, not stuff categorized generally as "secret" or "top secret" which is often stuff thousands of people know. Like, for example, an Army manual on repairing a Humvee might be "secret" even though thousands and thousands of soldiers have access to it.

But Top Secret/SCI is stuff that's actually highly secret and restricted to only a small circle of people.

Richman insisted he did not believe he had confirmed or provided classified intelligence to reporters but said he could not be 100 percent, the memos state, noting he could only make his leak denial "with a discount."

He leaked this information, he then denied he leaked it, but tossed in a "caveat: I might just have leaked it despite what I just swore to" as a defense in a future pejury case.

Which, fortunately for him, Biden never brought.

"Richman was pretty sure he did not confirm the Classified Information. However, Richman told the interviewing agents he was sure 'with a discount' that he did not tell Schmidt about the Classified Information," one FBI memo recounted.

I'm pretty sure I didn't commit the capital offense of Espionage but I can't be totally sure. Who remembers these things? It's like asking what I had for breakfast on June 2, 2012.

In the end, the Justice Department decided not to pursue any criminal charges against Comey or any of his lieutenants or now-Sen. Adam Schiff despite potential evidence of leaks, saying it could not be certain of who leaked what and when.

Deep State Convenience Status: Highly convenient.

But its interrogation of Richman and his admissions of significant contact with the Times' Schmidt provide the most detailed account to date of how Trump critics like Comey -- who was fired by the president -- used the media to craft narratives that ultimately turned out to be untrue or misleadingly overstated, the memos show.

Much more at the link. This is just the overview of the article.

The Democrat Media Party is a filthy pit of self-dealing and incest:

posted by Ace at 12:10 PM

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