President Donald Trump gloated about the filing of criminal charges against James Comey, whom he fired as FBI director in 2017, in his first White House term.
Actually taking those statements as they are, they are NOT actually contradictory.
Comey, in his September 2020 testimony, told Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, that he stood by prior testimony that he did not, as FBI director, authorize a leak of information to The Wall Street Journal for an October 2016 article that detailed a Justice Department probe of then-Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s email use.
So Comey did not authorize a leak.
Cruz told the Justice Department in a letter three months later that former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe admitted knowing about and authorizing the leak.
So McCabe knew about and authorized the leak.
McCabe insisted that Comey was aware of his decision to authorize the disclosure, while Comey “has denied this claim,” Cruz wrote.
So Comey was aware that McCabe authorized the leak, not himself.
That doesn’t prove at all that either Comey or McCabe lied, in fact it proves the exact opposite. McCabe admitted he authorized the leak, Comey knew about it but did not authorize it. Which is exactly what both of them said, there’s no lie there.
That assumes those are the actual facts of course. But if that’s the basis of the charges, there’s nothing there without even needing to get into any minutiae.
Actually taking those statements as they are, they are NOT actually contradictory.
So Comey did not authorize a leak.
So McCabe knew about and authorized the leak.
So Comey was aware that McCabe authorized the leak, not himself.
That doesn’t prove at all that either Comey or McCabe lied, in fact it proves the exact opposite. McCabe admitted he authorized the leak, Comey knew about it but did not authorize it. Which is exactly what both of them said, there’s no lie there.
That assumes those are the actual facts of course. But if that’s the basis of the charges, there’s nothing there without even needing to get into any minutiae.
Probably why real prosecutors declined to prosecute.
So the person who is lying is Ted Cruz. Or he’s too stupid not to conflate the statements. But it’s likely the former.
Are you saying that Lying Rafael “Ted” Cruz would lie?
To be fair, I also suggested he might be stupid.