DOJ Inspector General Report: James Comey Broke Protocol, but There Was No Bias

So the heavily anticipated Department of Justice Inspector General’s report will be released soon, and it is remarkable in just how unremarkable the early reports are of what will be released Thursday afternoon.

So first of all, let’s begin with the findings regarding former FBI Director James Comey.

According to two sources, what the report will show about Comey is that he screwed up in the Hillary Clinton email investigation.

Most notably, he was supposed to keep then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch in the loop, as far as the investigation. He didn’t do that.

What they didn’t find was bias on Comey’s part, or the part of the Justice Department.

 “We found no evidence that the conclusions by department prosecutors were affected by bias or other improper considerations, rather we concluded that they were based on the prosecutors’ assessment of facts, the law and past department practice,” the report said, according the people.

Meanwhile, the man is caught between a rock and a hard place.

Democrats accuse him of sinking Hillary Clinton’s chances at the presidency. Republicans think he tried to help her by not prosecuting.

In a finding that will further steam the britches of the Trump faithful, the report by Inspector General Michael Horowitz apparently also let’s FBI lovers, Peter Strzok and Lisa Page off the hook.

For those keeping up, Strzok and Page were both on special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigatory team. When email exchanges were discovered, showing them to be critical of President Trump, Mueller dismissed Strzok. Page had already moved on.

Horowitz did not find that FBI counterintelligence agent Peter Strzok and FBI lawyer Lisa Page “directly affected the specific investigative actions we reviewed,” according to the report’s conclusions, which were obtained Thursday by Bloomberg.

The report does note that they “cast a cloud” over the Mueller investigation.

How the report is ultimately viewed may be split down party lines. It doesn’t seem anyone is going to be convinced or happy about it, given our hyper-partisan climate.

There are already calls for more investigations, even before the official announcement of the findings.

Ultimately, what we’ll here today is that the Inspector General does not feel that the evidence warrants a new investigation into Hillary Clinton’s conduct, regarding her emails (so no “Lock her up!” moment is coming). Also, there was no provable bias – from James Comey or the Department of Justice.

James Comey responded to the news of the report, stating that he’d goofed rather calmly.

I respect the DOJ IG office, which is why I urged them to do this review. The conclusions are reasonable, even though I disagree with some. People of good faith can see an unprecedented situation differently. I pray no Director faces it again. Thanks to IG’s people for hard work.

— James Comey (@Comey) June 14, 2018

At least he’s not calling it “fake news.”