The FBI has launched criminal probes into the former heads of both the CIA and FBI after they investigated Donald Trump’s links to Russia in the 2016 election.
Former CIA director John Brennan and former FBI Director James Comey are at the center of the probe, as authorities explore whether they made false statements to Congress, Fox News reported.
The duo investigated claims of Russian interference in the 2016 elections in which Trump defeated former Hillary Clinton.
The scope of the criminal investigations into Brennan and Comey was unclear, the report added.
Trump-nominated CIA Director John Ratcliffe referred Brennan, who served in that role under former Democratic President Barack Obama, for potential prosecution, according to the report.
A criminal investigation does not necessarily result in charges.
‘I am glad to see that the Department of Justice is opening up this investigation,’ White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Jesse Watters.
The probes reportedly target two former officials who have long drawn the ire of Trump and his supporters for their role in investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election.
The FBI has launched criminal probes into the former heads of both the CIA and FBI after they investigated Donald Trump’s links to Russia in the 2016 election
Comey led the FBI when authorities began a criminal investigation in 2016 into potential coordination between the Trump campaign and the Russian government to influence the election.
Trump fired Comey in 2017 early in his first term after Comey publicly confirmed Trump was under investigation.
The probe was then taken over by former Special Counsel Robert Mueller, who found no evidence of a criminal conspiracy between Trump’s 2016 campaign and Russia.
Trump railed against the investigation for years and has repeatedly dismissed it as the ‘Russia hoax.’
Brennan led the CIA when US intelligence assessed, in a report made public in January 2017, that Russian President Vladimir Putin sought to sway the 2016 vote in favor of Trump.
A CIA review released last week found flaws in the preparation of the 2017 assessment, but it did not contest its underlying conclusion.
Reuters reached out to Brennan, Comey, the CIA and the FBI for comment but had not heard back at the time of publication.
Trump has long branded the FBI’s Trump-Russia probe, which the bureau code-named Crossfire Hurricane, as a politically motivated ‘witch hunt’.
Former FBI Director James Comey is at the center of the probe
Former CIA director John Brennan is at the center of the probe, as authorities explore whether they made false statements to Congress
During Trump’s first term, the Justice Department appointed a separate special counsel, John Durham, to examine any missteps in the FBI’s Russia investigation.
Durham found that the FBI did not have enough ‘factual evidence’ to investigate allegations of Trump-Russia collusion.
Durham’s report is a comprehensive summary of findings related to investigations into whether the then-Trump campaign in 2016 colluded with Russia to meddle with the election outcome.
It found that the Department of Justice and the FBI ‘failed to uphold their mission of strict fidelity to the law’ when launching the Trump-Russia probe .
Durham brought charges against three lower-level figures who worked on the probe or provided information to investigators, but did not find evidence of a conspiracy to target Trump.
At the time the report was released, Trump said it felt like a ‘great vindication’, noting the report was ‘widely praised.’
‘All of these people are — I guess you could call it treason. You could call it a lot of different things. But this should never be allowed to happen in our country again,’ added Trump.
This article was originally published by a www.dailymail.co.uk . Read the Original article here. .