Comey Testifies AG Lynch ‘Pressured’ Him To Use Clinton Campaign Language; “It Gave Me A Queasy Feeling”

ZeroHedge.com

In perhaps the most stunning section of former FBI Director Comey’s testimony today, he detailed his interaction with then Attorney General Loretta Lynch about his specific language about the Clinton Email “investigation.”

For the first time, former FBI Director James Comey, who is testifying today before the Senate Intelligence Committee, said that President Obama’s Attorney General Loretta Lynch asked him to downplay the Hillary Clinton’s email scandal…

*COMEY: CONCERNED WITH AG DIRECTIVE ON CLINTON `MATTER’

*COMEY: LYNCH’S LANGUAGE `TRACKED’ CLINTON CAMPAIGN’S

*COMEY: GAVE IMPRESSION LYNCH WAS LOOKING TO ALIGN W/CAMPAIGN

*COMEY SAYS HE HAD `QUEASY FEELING’ AFTER LYNCH INTERACTION

As DailyCaller notes, Comey said Lynch instructed Comey not to call the criminal investigation into the Clinton server a criminal investigation. Instead, Lynch told Comey to call it a “matter,” Comey said, “which confused me.” Comey cited that pressure from Lynch to downplay the investigation as one of the reasons he held a press conference to recommend the Department of Justice not seek to indict Clinton.

“Probably the only other consideration that I guess I can talk about in an open setting is that at one point, the attorney general had directed me not to call it an investigation, but instead to call it a matter, which confused me and concerned me,” he said when asked about the email investigation.

So who was obstructing or trying to interfere there?

Comey said that this troubled him greatly and convinced him, “I have to step away from the department if we’re too close this case credibly.”

Still, we note that despite his admission that the conversation “gave me a queasy feeling,” Comey went ahead and followed her orders because “that was not a hill i wanted to die on…”

Under questioning by panel chairman Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC), Comey said that he was uncomfortable with the unexpected meeting Lynch had with former President Bill Clinton on an airport tarmac last year. Comey said that meeting convinced him that the independence of the investigation was tainted with regard to the Justice Department and led him to go public with the bureau’s findings on Clinton.

Then Comey added in later testimony that “Loretta Lynch had appearance of conflict of interest.”

As a reminder, Circa notes that when Comey testified on May 3 before the Senate Judiciary Committee, he was asked about the Lynch meeting. He told lawmakers “a number of things had gone on which I can’t talk about yet, that made me worry that the department leadership could not credibly complete the investigation and decline prosecution without grievous damage to the American people’s confidence in the justice system.” Bill Clinton met with Lynch in June 2016 at an airport in Phoenix, Arizona. Lynch said at the time that “our conversation was a great deal about grandchildren, it was primarily social about our travels and he mentioned golf he played in Phoenix.” On March 15, Judicial Watch, a conservative watchdog group, sued the Justice Department for all relevant material related to the Lynch and Clinton Phoenix meeting.

Four things spring to mind:

1) The utter politicization of the Justice Department (from the top-down) under Obama, has now been exposed as “fact” if Comey is to be believed. 2) Why did Comey think that a Clinton “Hill” was not worth dying on, but a Trump “Hill” was? 3) Why didn’t Comey “memorialize” this conversation in one of his memos at the time… as he said he did immediately after his Trump conversation? 4) So the only official to “pressure” Comey during his tenure was Loretta Lynch?

But hey, let’s spend the day ignoring that and instead focusing on speculation about Trump and his….

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http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-06-08/comey-admits-ag-lynch-pressured-him-use-clinton-campaign-language-it-gave-me-queasy-