Fox News contributor Andy McCarthy said Friday he does not believe the Trump administration can build a reputable case against former FBI Director James Comey based on leaked information about an investigation into emails from former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and President Trump’s ties to Russia’s 2016 election interference.
“I don’t think there’s a case,” McCarthy said during a Friday appearance on Fox Business’s “Mornings with Maria.”
The Fox News legal analyst said much of the Trump administration’s evidence is less about Russiagate than “premised on something that’s not true” regarding interactions between Comey and his then-FBI Deputy Andrew McCabe.
“McCabe said that Comey authorized him to leak to The Wall Street Journal,” according to McCarthy.
“If you look closely at what McCabe said, what McCabe said was that he directed a leak to The Wall Street Journal and told Comey about it after the fact,” he told host Maria Bartiromo.
“So it’s true that Comey never authorized it in the sense of OKing it before it happened,” he added. “I don’t see how they can make that case.”
Others have questioned the validity of charges brought against Comey as well.
Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) alleged Attorney General Pam Bondi was pursuing the case against Comey in an effort to appease the president.
“If she felt that there was rock-solid evidence to indict Jim Comey, she wouldn’t have finished her official statement with the line, ‘We will follow the facts in this case,’” Kaine said during an MSNBC appearance Thursday, referring to Bondi’s official announcement of Comey’s indictment.
“You know, that’s what you do if you’re like an investigating officer or even a prosecutor to decide whether to indict somebody. You don’t indict somebody and then say, ‘Well, now, we got to figure out what the facts tell us,’” he added on “The Briefing with Jen Psaki.”
Kaine accused Bondi of revealing a “deep ambivalence” about what Trump is “ordering” her to do.
Earlier in the year, McCarthy said Bondi has shown partisanship by initiating the formation of a “Weaponization Working Group” at the Justice Department.
“News flash: Pam Bondi now represents the Justice Department — in fact, leads it. It is thus her ethical duty to advance whatever good-faith defense there is of the government’s conduct,” McCarthy wrote in a February op-ed.
“If she is just going to spout Trump’s grievances without putting the Justice Department’s egregious behavior in context, then she’s engaging in partisan law enforcement, exactly the noxious practice she claims to be rooting out.”
However, Trump and FBI Director Kash Patel have denied claims that they are using their power to pursue political enemies.
“Career FBI agents, intel analysts, and staff led the investigation into Comey and others. They called the balls and strikes and will continue to do so. The wildly false accusations attacking this FBI for the politicization of law enforcement comes from the same bankrupt media that sold the world on Russia Gate- it’s hypocrisy on steroids,” Patel wrote Friday on social platform X.
The president later followed up with similar comments, broadly referring to Democrats being investigated or prosecuted by department as “corrupt.”
“These were corrupt, radical-left Democrats,” Trump said outside the White House.
“They weaponized the Justice Department like nobody in history. What they’ve done is terrible. And so I hope — frankly, I hope there are others. Because you can’t let this happen to a country,” he added.
