OIG Report Released: Full text

Here you go, straight from the horse's mouth:

www.justice.gov...

From the press release:

Department of Justice (DOJ) Inspector General Michael E. Horowitz announced today the release of a report examining various actions by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the DOJ in advance of the 2016 election in connection with the investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server (referred to by the FBI and DOJ as the “Midyear” investigation).

oig.justice.gov...

There will also be a press conference at 1730 Eastern Time. Happy reading!

a reply to: Zelun

Tick-tock...

a reply to: Zelun

I know everyone is partisan to one degree or another.

I just hope that this leads to people guilty of crimes, getting punished.


Is it too much to ask for?

originally posted by: DBCowboy
a reply to: Zelun

I know everyone is partisan to one degree or another.

I just hope that this leads to people guilty of crimes, getting punished.


Is it too much to ask for?

I'll second that.

a reply to: Zelun

568 pages...this might take a while...

a reply to: Zelun

Thanks for posting this.

Good thing I had a good lunch because this is a nothing burger.

a reply to: Zelun

This pretty much I just predicted so far from what's now being reported and what I'm reading. Certain texts gave an appearance of bias but exhaustive examination of the actual investigation didn't turn up any impropriety.

There were clearly tensions and disagreements in a number of important areas between Midyear agents and prosecutors. However, we did not find documentary or testimonial evidence that improper considerations, including political bias, directly affected the specific investigative decisions we reviewed in Chapter Five, or that the justifications offered for these decisions were pretextual.

Nonetheless, these messages cast a cloud over the FBI’s handling of the Midyear investigation and the investigation’s credibility. But our review did not find evidence to connect the political views expressed in these messages to the specific investigative decisions that we reviewed; rather, consistent with the analytic approach described above, we found that these specific decisions were the result of discretionary judgments made during the course of an investigation by the Midyear agents and prosecutors and that these judgment calls were not unreasonable. The broader impact of these text and instant messages, including on such matters as the public perception of the FBI and the Midyear investigation, are discussed in Chapter Twelve of our report.

originally posted by: DBCowboy
a reply to: Zelun

I know everyone is partisan to one degree or another.

I just hope that this leads to people guilty of crimes, getting punished.


Is it too much to ask for?

In this world right now, it just might be. I hope to be wrong on that tho and that those in power are finally, at long last held to an equal standard of justice that us peons are subjected to.

originally posted by: sligtlyskeptical
a reply to: Zelun

Thanks for posting this.

Good thing I had a good lunch because this is a nothing burger.

read it already?

that was fast

Well I had hope Horowitz wasn't swamp but it appears he is nothing more than a "fixer" Harvey Keitel-style. That smelly punk Sessions too.

originally posted by: theantediluvian
a reply to: Zelun

This pretty much I just predicted so far from what's now being reported and what I'm reading. Certain texts gave an appearance of bias but exhaustive examination of the actual investigation didn't turn up any impropriety.

There were clearly tensions and disagreements in a number of important areas between Midyear agents and prosecutors. However, we did not find documentary or testimonial evidence that improper considerations, including political bias, directly affected the specific investigative decisions we reviewed in Chapter Five, or that the justifications offered for these decisions were pretextual.

Nonetheless, these messages cast a cloud over the FBI’s handling of the Midyear investigation and the investigation’s credibility. But our review did not find evidence to connect the political views expressed in these messages to the specific investigative decisions that we reviewed; rather, consistent with the analytic approach described above, we found that these specific decisions were the result of discretionary judgments made during the course of an investigation by the Midyear agents and prosecutors and that these judgment calls were not unreasonable. The broader impact of these text and instant messages, including on such matters as the public perception of the FBI and the Midyear investigation, are discussed in Chapter Twelve of our report.

The part about not having any evidence of political bias is specifically talking about Comey, hence the reference to Chapter 5, which is all about Comey. It later goes on to state there was political bias at least from Strzok, who was one of the lead investigators. That's huge.

In assessing the decision to prioritize the Russia investigation over following up on the Midyear-related investigative lead discovered on the Weiner laptop, we were particularly concerned about text messages sent by Strzok and Page that potentially indicated or created the appearance that investigative decisions they made were impacted by bias or improper considerations. Most of the text messages raising such questions pertained to the Russia investigation, and the implication in some of these text messages, particularly Strzok’s August 8 text message (“we’ll stop” candidate Trump from being elected), was that Strzok might be willing to take official action to impact a presidential candidate’s electoral prospects. Under these circumstances, we did not have confidence that Strzok’s decision to prioritize the Russia investigation over following up on the Midyear-related investigative lead discovered on the Weiner laptop was free from bias.

a reply to: theantediluvian

Fast reader you are... and a lawyer too?

Or did you just go by what CNN is reporting right now...

You know, nothing to see here, just move along...

For me, I'm going with what DBCowboy is hoping for.

People that are guilty of crimes should be punished.

I see an uptick in Atenolol sales to liberals in the coming months...

The report is Damning for Comey and Lynch.

Wait till people actually read it.

🎃🤷

originally posted by: face23785

originally posted by: theantediluvian
a reply to: Zelun

This pretty much I just predicted so far from what's now being reported and what I'm reading. Certain texts gave an appearance of bias but exhaustive examination of the actual investigation didn't turn up any impropriety.

There were clearly tensions and disagreements in a number of important areas between Midyear agents and prosecutors. However, we did not find documentary or testimonial evidence that improper considerations, including political bias, directly affected the specific investigative decisions we reviewed in Chapter Five, or that the justifications offered for these decisions were pretextual.

Nonetheless, these messages cast a cloud over the FBI’s handling of the Midyear investigation and the investigation’s credibility. But our review did not find evidence to connect the political views expressed in these messages to the specific investigative decisions that we reviewed; rather, consistent with the analytic approach described above, we found that these specific decisions were the result of discretionary judgments made during the course of an investigation by the Midyear agents and prosecutors and that these judgment calls were not unreasonable. The broader impact of these text and instant messages, including on such matters as the public perception of the FBI and the Midyear investigation, are discussed in Chapter Twelve of our report.

The part about not having any evidence of political bias is specifically talking about Comey, hence the reference to Chapter 5, which is all about Comey. It later goes on to state there was political bias at least from Strzok, who was one of the lead investigators. That's huge.

Is it considering it was comey making thr decisions. Comey took on things beyond the scope of his duties. The only thing i think Comey did was decide to speak about the Hillary investigation while at the dame rime rufuse to even admit there was a Trump investigation.

Why would he hide one publicize the other?

a reply to: face23785

Okay maybe I spoke too soon. It was hard to imagine they could find no evidence of bias with Strzok just from the texts alone, but looks like the IG did

And as Burntheships mentioned, Strzok was a major player in all the relevant investigations.

Looking forward to reading the report later.

We found that Strzok used his personal email accounts for official government business on several occasions, including forwarding an email from his FBI account to his personal email account about the proposed search warrant the Midyear team was seeking on the Weiner laptop. This email included a draft of the search warrant affidavit, which contained information from the Weiner investigation that appears to have been under seal at the time in the Southern District of New York and information obtained pursuant to a grand jury subpoena issued in the Eastern District of Virginia in the Midyear investigation. We refer to the FBI the issue of whether Strzok’s use of personal email accounts violated FBI and Department policies.

I don't see how that's not a glaring conflict-of-interest on behalf of the investigators, since they're investigating someone for using personal email to do official business.

ETA: Department and FBI policies are based on laws passed by Congress.

No, didn't read it all. Read their recommendations though. That seems to amount to crap.

originally posted by: dragonridr

originally posted by: face23785

originally posted by: theantediluvian
a reply to: Zelun

This pretty much I just predicted so far from what's now being reported and what I'm reading. Certain texts gave an appearance of bias but exhaustive examination of the actual investigation didn't turn up any impropriety.

There were clearly tensions and disagreements in a number of important areas between Midyear agents and prosecutors. However, we did not find documentary or testimonial evidence that improper considerations, including political bias, directly affected the specific investigative decisions we reviewed in Chapter Five, or that the justifications offered for these decisions were pretextual.

Nonetheless, these messages cast a cloud over the FBI’s handling of the Midyear investigation and the investigation’s credibility. But our review did not find evidence to connect the political views expressed in these messages to the specific investigative decisions that we reviewed; rather, consistent with the analytic approach described above, we found that these specific decisions were the result of discretionary judgments made during the course of an investigation by the Midyear agents and prosecutors and that these judgment calls were not unreasonable. The broader impact of these text and instant messages, including on such matters as the public perception of the FBI and the Midyear investigation, are discussed in Chapter Twelve of our report.

The part about not having any evidence of political bias is specifically talking about Comey, hence the reference to Chapter 5, which is all about Comey. It later goes on to state there was political bias at least from Strzok, who was one of the lead investigators. That's huge.

Is it considering it was comey making thr decisions. Comey took on things beyond the scope of his duties. The only thing i think Comey did was decide to speak about the Hillary investigation while at the dame rime rufuse to even admit there was a Trump investigation.

Why would he hide one publicize the other?

If you understand how a large organization like this works it's very significant. The director can't possibly get down in the weeds of every investigation, he's limited to what he's told by the people actually conducting the investigation. If one of the people conducting it was biased, it could very well affect his decisions without him even knowing it.

originally posted by: xuenchen
The report is Damning for Comey and Lynch.

Wait till people actually read it.

🎃🤷

1. What matters is any criminal referrals to prosecutor Huber.

2. The 3rd section of the I.G. Report will focus on SPYGATE. That will make today's release look like a playground spat.

a reply to: face23785

The part about not having any evidence of political bias is specifically talking about Comey,

No, it's not. Here's the paragraph before:

In particular, we were concerned about text messages exchanged by FBI Deputy Assistant Director Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, Special Counsel to the Deputy Director, that potentially indicated or created the appearance that investigative decisions were impacted by bias or improper considerations. As we describe in Chapter Twelve of our report, most of the text messages raising such questions pertained to the Russia investigation, which was not a part of this review. Nonetheless, the suggestion in certain Russia-related text messages in August 2016 that Strzok might be willing to take official action to impact presidential candidate Trump’s electoral prospects caused us to question the earlier Midyear investigative decisions in which Strzok was involved, and whether he took specific actions in the Midyear investigation based on his political views. As we describe Chapter Five of our report, we found that Strzok was not the sole decisionmaker for any of the specific Midyear investigative decisions we examined in that chapter. We further found evidence that in some instances Strzok and Page advocated for more aggressive
investigative measures in the Midyear investigation such as the use of grand jury subpoenas and search
warrants to obtain evidence.

That's the paragraph immediately preceding what I excerpted. It's clearly not about Comey.