The Federal Bureau of Investigation apparently acted on a Russian-generated report that purported to show coordination between Hillary Clinton and the U.S. Justice Department.
The memo prompted former FBI Director James Comey to disclose the bureau’s investigation into Clinton’s emails, was “bad intelligence” and “possibly even fake,” the Washington Post reports.
And we all know what happened next.
According to the FBI’s own assessment, the American contacts mentioned in the Russian document—which described an email exchange between former Attorney General Loretta Lynch and officials working on behalf of 2016 Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton—deny having had any conversations “remotely” similar to those described in the memo. By August 2016, the Post reports, the FBI concluded the memo was unreliable.
Current and former officials say that document led Comey to announce, in July of 2016, that Clinton was “extremely careless” in her handling of classified information, while simultaneously exonerating the former Secretary of State of any wrongdoing. As the Post notes, Comey’s announcement “set in motion” a chain of events that arguably led to Clinton’s demise.
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