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A Republic Under Assault Page 16


  The documents we uncovered include an email showing McCabe’s wife, Jill McCabe, was recruited for a Virginia state senate race in February 2015 by then–Virginia lieutenant governor Ralph Northam’s office.

  The news that Clinton used a private email server broke five days later, on March 2, 2015. Five days after that, former Clinton Foundation board member and Democrat Party fund-raiser Virginia governor Terry McAuliffe met with the McCabes. She announced her candidacy on March 12. Soon afterward, Clinton/McAuliffe-aligned political groups donated nearly $700,000 (40 percent of the campaign’s total funds) to McCabe’s wife for her campaign. My colleague Micah Morrison detailed the devastating timeline after the initial campaign recruitment call:

  Less than two weeks later, in March 2015, McCabe and his wife drive to Richmond for what they thought was a meeting with a Virginia state senator to discuss Dr. McCabe’s possible run for office.

  In Richmond, according to the OIG report, they are told there had been “a change of plans” and that “Governor McAuliffe wanted to speak to Dr. McCabe at the Governor’s mansion.” It’s around this time that a veteran FBI agent’s radar might start blinking.

  McCabe and his wife meet with McAuliffe for 30 to 45 minutes, according to the OIG report. Fundraising was discussed. “Governor McAuliffe said that he and the Democratic Party would support Dr. McCabe’s candidacy.” McAuliffe asked McCabe about his occupation and “McCabe told him he worked for the FBI but they did not discuss McCabe’s work or any FBI business.” McCabe later described it to an FBI official as a “surreal meeting.”

  After the meeting, the couple rode to a local event with the governor, then returned to the mansion with the governor to retrieve their car.

  McCabe informed FBI ethics officials and lawyers about the meeting and consulted with them about his wife’s plans. No one raised strong objections. McCabe recused himself from all public corruption cases in Virginia and Dr. McCabe jumped into the race.

  On July 2015, the FBI opened an investigation into Mrs. Clinton’s email practices.

  Let’s pause to note here that while the official FBI investigation was opened in July 2015, Mrs. Clinton was known to be in hot water as far back as March 2015, when the State Department inspector general revealed her widespread use of a private, nongovernment email server.

  Swamp cats will notice that March 2015 is also when Andrew and Jill McCabe got their surprise audience with McAuliffe, the longtime Clinton moneyman.

  The McCabe fortunes rose in the autumn of 2015. Mr. McCabe was promoted to associate deputy director of the FBI. Dr. McCabe received $675,000 from two McAuliffe-connected entities for her state senate race. They were by far the biggest donations to her campaign.

  In November 2015, Dr. McCabe lost her race.

  In January 2016, the FBI opened an investigation into the Clinton Foundation.

  On February 1, Mr. McCabe was promoted again, to deputy director of the FBI.

  Despite the McAuliffe connection, the OIG report notes, there was no FBI re-evaluation of McCabe’s recusals following his promotions. Although recused from Virginia public corruption investigations, he retained a senior role in Clinton-related matters.

  In May 2016, news broke that McAuliffe was under FBI investigation for campaign finance violations. CNN reported that investigators were scrutinizing “McAuliffe’s time as a board member of the Clinton Global Initiative” and Chinese businessman Wang Wenliang, a U.S. permanent resident who made large donations to both the McAuliffe 2013 gubernatorial campaign and to the Clinton Foundation.

  On October 23, the Wall Street Journal revealed the McAuliffe-linked donations to Dr. McCabe’s campaign. At FBI headquarters, McCabe resists pressure from senior executives to recuse himself from all Clinton-related matters.

  Finally, on November 1—a week before the presidential election—McCabe recused himself from the Clinton email and Clinton Foundation investigations.

  Per usual, it wasn’t the IG that first exposed McCabe’s conflicts but Judicial Watch through its FOIA litigation.

  Again, in January 2016, the FBI had reportedly begun investigating the Clinton Foundation, as it expanded from the email probe launched in response to our forcing the disclosure of the Clinton email cache. In October 2016, FBI agents were told they did not have “enough evidence to move forward” with their investigation of the foundation.

  Things went off the rails when the Wall Street Journal published an article detailing McCabe’s links to Clinton world. An October 23, 2016, email we uncovered shows McCabe running the response effort to the Wall Street Journal article published that day, titled “Clinton Ally Aided Campaign of FBI Official’s Wife.” McCabe provides Michael Kortan, the assistant director of public affairs, his version of a timeline of events surrounding the Clinton investigation and his wife’s campaign. McCabe said he contacted then–FBI chief of staff Chuck Roseburg about Jill McCabe’s candidacy and was told that “the D [Comey] has no issue with it.”

  Internally, the Wall Street Journal article started a flurry of emails among Mrs. McCabe’s campaign, Kortan, Director McCabe, and the FBI’s general counsel. Part of that exchange is an email from McCabe to someone in the General Counsel’s Office: “Sucks pretty much. Buckle in. It’s going to get rough.” The colleague responds, “I know. It’s awful. I shouldn’t be shocked by now, but I really am appalled.” McCabe also forwarded the article to Comey who responded, “Copy.”

  On October 24, 2016, a memo was sent to all Special Agents in Charge, assistant directors, executive directors, and the General Counsel’s Office regarding the Wall Street Journal article discussing campaign activities concerning Mrs. McCabe. Kortan suggested that questions could be referred to his office and he attached an “Overview of Deputy Director McCabe’s Recusal Related to Dr. McCabe’s Campaign for Political Office.” One of the “Overview” talking points confirms that McCabe was involved in the Clinton email investigation while he was running the FBI’s Washington Field Office before being promoted to DAD. The following question and answer is provided in the talking points:

  While at [Washington Field Office] did Mr. McCabe provide assistance to the Clinton investigation?

  After the referral was made, FBI Headquarters asked the Washington Field Office for personnel to conduct a special investigation. McCabe was serving as [assistant director] and provided personnel resources. However, he was not told what the investigation was about. In February 2016 McCabe became Deputy Director and began overseeing the Clinton investigation.

  The Overview also shows, if asked whether McCabe played any role in his wife’s campaign, the scripted response was: “No. Then–[assistant director] McCabe played no role, attended no events and did not participate in fundraising or support of any kind.”

  This was false.

  In June 2017, Circa reported that social media photos showed “McCabe wearing a T-shirt supporting his wife’s campaign during a public event and then posting a photo on social media urging voters to join him in voting for his wife.”

  And we uncovered docs that show repeated use of the official FBI email system in connection with Mrs. McCabe’s political campaign. For example:

  On March 13, 2015, Mrs. McCabe emails to her husband’s official FBI email account a draft press release announcing her run for state senate.

  In August 2015, McCabe uses his official FBI email account to advise a redacted recipient to visit his wife’s campaign website: “Jill has been busy as hell since she decided to run for VA state senate (long story). Check her out on Facebook as Dr. Jill McCabe for Senate.”

  On November 2, 2015, Mrs. McCabe forwards an email to her husband—then the assistant director in charge of the FBI’s Washington office—that accuses her opponent of extorting local businessmen. The email was sent to her husband’s official FBI account.

  (The McCabe documents also show that FBI leadership was sensitive to reports of FBI internal dissent with then-director Comey’s handling of the Clinton investigation. On O
ctober 24, 2016, Mrs. McCabe forwarded to Director McCabe a True Pundit article titled, “FBI Director Lobbied Against Criminal Charges for Hillary After Clinton Insider Paid His Wife $700,000.” The story reported that former FBI executive assistant director John Giacalone resigned in the middle of the Clinton email investigation because he saw it going “sideways” and that Jill McCabe received money from a PAC headed by McAuliffe, who was under investigation by the FBI for campaign finance law violations. McCabe forwarded the article to Comey, noting “FYI. Heavyweight source.” Comey replied to McCabe, copying Chief of Staff James Rybicki, saying, “This still reads to me like someone not involved in the investigation at all, maybe somebody who heard rumors.…”)

  So as the FBI pursued a baseless investigation against Trump, the DOJ inspector general report detailed evidence that the Obama DOJ sought to shut down the FBI investigation of Clinton Foundation in August 2016 (just as we were finally exposing the Clinton pay-to-play scandal docs to the world):

  McCabe [fired former deputy director of the FBI] told the OIG that on August 12, 2016, he received a telephone call from PADAG [Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General, likely Matthew Axelrod] regarding the FBI’s handling of the CF [Clinton Foundation] Investigation (the “PADAG call”). McCabe said that PADAG expressed concerns about FBI agents taking overt steps in the CF Investigation during the presidential campaign. According to McCabe, he pushed back, asking “are you telling me that I need to shut down a validly predicated investigation?” McCabe told us that the conversation was “very dramatic” and he never had a similar confrontation like the PADAG call with a high-level Department official in his entire FBI career.

  So the irony is that McCabe actually pushed back against DOJ efforts to help protect Hillary Clinton. And after it became known about his Clinton conflicts, McCabe then tried to rescue his reputation (and the FBI’s) by improperly leaking confirmation of the Clinton Foundation investigation to the Wall Street Journal. It was this leak and associated lies that resulted in McCabe’s firing and an IG referral for prosecution (which was not pursued by DOJ, of course).

  CLINTON NOT OUT OF THE WOODS YET

  That email scandal is far from over. Secrets are still being hidden. The rule of law is still being flaunted. Because of that, we have never stopped our investigations and never stopped digging.

  In 2016, Judge Sullivan allowed Judicial Watch to depose many top State Department officials and members of the Clinton inner circle—Huma Abedin and Cheryl Mills, in particular—about the Clinton email scheme. As Judge Sullivan remarked during one hearing, “We wouldn’t be here today if this employee [Hillary Clinton] had followed government policy.” But Judge Sullivan allowed only limited discovery and there was more to be uncovered.

  Judge Royce Lamberth, the federal judge handling the Judicial Watch lawsuit that uncovered the Clinton email scandal, saw there was more information the court needed to resolve the case and authorized discovery with an initial ruling in March 2016:

  Where there is evidence of government wrong-doing and bad faith, as here, limited discovery is appropriate, even though it is exceedingly rare in FOIA cases.

  * * *

  [Judicial Watch] is certainly entitled to dispute the State Department’s position that it has no obligation to produce these documents because it did not “possess” or “control” them at the time the FOIA request was made. The State Department’s willingness to now search documents voluntarily turned over to the Department by Secretary Clinton and other officials hardly transforms such a search into an “adequate” or “reasonable one. [Judicial Watch] is not relying on “speculation” or “surmise” as the State Department claims. [Judicial Watch] is relying on constantly shifting admissions by the Government and the former government officials.

  The court then moved the ball forward at an extraordinary October 2018 hearing, stating, “The information that I was provided was clearly false regarding the adequacy of the [Clinton email] search and… what we now know turned out to be the Secretary’s email system.”

  Turning his attention to the Department of Justice, Judge Lamberth said that he was “dumbfounded” by the agency’s inspector general report revealing that Cheryl Mills had been given immunity and was allowed to accompany former secretary of state Hillary Clinton to her FBI interview:

  I had myself found that Cheryl Mills had committed perjury and lied under oath in a published opinion I had issued in a Judicial Watch case where I found her unworthy of belief, and I was quite shocked to find out she had been given immunity—by the Justice Department in the Hillary Clinton email case. So I did not know that until I read the IG report and learned that and that she had accompanied the Secretary to her interview.

  (In an April 28, 2008, ruling relating to Mills’s conduct as a White House official in responding to concerns about lost White House email records, Judge Lamberth called Mills’s participation in the matter “loathsome.” He further stated Mills was responsible for “the most critical error made in this entire fiasco… Mills’ actions were totally inadequate to address the problem.”)

  Lamberth also complained that the Justice Department attorney representing the State Department was using “doublespeak,” and playing “word games.” The back-and-forth with the DOJ lawyer representing the State Department (Mr. Prince) follows:

  THE COURT: The State Department told me that it had produced all records when it moved for summary judgment and you filed that motion. That was not true when that motion was filed.

  MR. PRINCE: At that time, we had produced all—

  THE COURT: It was not true.

  MR. PRINCE: Yes, it was—well, Your Honor, it might be that our search could be found to be inadequate, but that declaration was absolutely true.

  THE COURT: It was not true. It was a lie.

  MR. PRINCE: It was not a lie, Your Honor.

  THE COURT: What—that’s doublespeak.

  * * *

  MR. PRINCE: There’s strong precedent saying that items not in the State’s possession do not need to be searched.…

  THE COURT: And that’s because the Secretary was doing this on a private server? So it wasn’t in the State’s possession?… So you’re playing the same word game she played?

  Judge Lamberth said he was relieved that he did not allow the case to be shut down prematurely, as the State Department had requested:

  The case started with a motion for summary judgment [seeking to close the case] here and which I denied and allowed limited discovery because it was clear to me that at the time that I ruled initially, that false statements were made to me by career State Department officials and it became more clear through discovery that the information that I was provided was clearly false regarding the adequacy of the search and this—what we now know turned out to be the Secretary’s email system.

  I don’t know the details of what kind of IG inquiry there was into why these career officials at the State Department would have filed false affidavits with me. I don’t know the details of why the Justice Department lawyers did not know false affidavits were being filed with me, but I was very relieved that I did not accept them and that I allowed limited discovery into what had happened.

  Judge Lamberth then followed up with a ruling in December 2018:

  [T]he Court ORDERS the parties to meet and confer to plan discovery into (a) whether Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email while Secretary of State was an intentional attempt to evade FOIA; (b) whether the State Department’s attempts to settle this case in late 2014 and early 2015 amounted to bad faith; and (c) whether State has adequately searched for records responsive to Judicial Watch’s requests.

  Terming Clinton’s use of her private email system “one of the gravest modern offenses to government transparency,” Lamberth wrote in his memorandum opinion:

  [H]is [President Barack Obama’s] State and Justice Departments fell far short. So far short that the court questions, even now, whether they are acting in good faith. Did Hillary Clin
ton use her private email as Secretary of State to thwart this lofty goal [the Obama-announced standard for transparency]? Was the State Department’s attempt to settle this FOIA case in 2014 an effort to avoid searching—and disclosing the existence of—Clinton’s missing emails? And has State ever adequately searched for records in this case?

  At best, State’s attempt to pass off its deficient search as legally adequate during settlement negotiations was negligence born out of incompetence. At worst, career employees in the State and Justice Departments colluded to scuttle public scrutiny of Clinton, skirt FOIA, and hoodwink this Court.

  Turning his attention to the Department of Justice, Lamberth wrote:

  The current Justice Department [AG Barr’s!] made things worse. When the government last appeared before the Court, counsel claimed, “it is not true to say we misled either Judicial Watch or the Court.” When accused of “doublespeak,” counsel denied vehemently, feigned offense, and averred complete candor. When asked why State masked the inadequacy of its initial search, counsel claimed that the officials who initially responded to Judicial Watch’s request didn’t realize Clinton’s emails were missing, and that it took them two months to “figure out what was going on.”… Counsel’s responses strain credulity.

  Citing an email (uncovered as a result of Judicial Watch’s lawsuit) in which Hillary Clinton acknowledged that Benghazi was a terrorist attack immediately after it happened, Judge Lamberth asked:

  Did State know Clinton deemed the Benghazi attack terrorism hours after it happened, contradicting the Obama Administration’s subsequent claim of a protest-gone-awry?