Former FBI director James Comey has been charged by federal prosecutors with transmitting national defence information and conspiring to transmit such information, marking the third federal case against him.
Comey, a longtime target of US president
Donald Trump since he launched the FBI investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, responded to the charges in a video posted on Substack on Monday.
“Well, they’re back again. It would almost be funny if it weren’t such an appalling abuse of the Department of Justice, one that we cannot become numb to,” Comey said after the charges were made public.
“Nothing’s changed with me. I’m still innocent. I’m still not afraid of these people, and I still believe in the independent federal judiciary,” he added.
The case had been proceeding under seal since October 5. Comey’s defence lawyers filed a motion to dismiss the charges 10 days earlier, according to the report. He has not been indicted in the case.
The allegations stem from a New York Times article published on October 5, 2016, titled “Yahoo said to have aided US email surveillance by adapting spam filter”, written by reporter Charlie Savage.
In a filing unsealed on Monday, special assistant US attorney Dustin Farahnak said investigators had found evidence that Comey sought to correct what he considered misinformation in a Reuters article published the previous day. Farahnak alleged that Comey directed staff to speak to Savage about specific accuracy concerns relating to the Reuters report, thereby transferring classified information illegally.
The charges add to the legal cases involving Comey, who has remained a prominent target of Trump’s criticism since their clash over the FBI’s investigation into Russian election interference in 2016.