The war on Andrew McCabe
We do not yet know the findings of an internal FBI investigation by career Justice Department officials into the conduct of former bureau Deputy Director Andrew McCabe. But McCabe's firing by Attorney General Jeff Sessions gives off the thick stench of being a political hit job of the lowest order, one part of the campaign to discredit witnesses against President Trump in the probe into Russian election meddling.
It gives off that stench because of its nasty, near-inexplicable timing, designed to deny McCabe his full pension less than two days before he would have earned it.
Because it follows months of goading by Trump of Sessions. Because it chillingly echoes the template laid out when the President fired another perceived enemy, former McCabe boss James Comey.
Because Trump engaged in disgusting but not atypical political gloating in the immediate aftermath of the termination.
And because, immediately after the firing, McCabe released a detailed, indignant and highly credible statement in his own defense.
The career G-man now fights to preserve his good name amid a smear campaign led by the man with the biggest megaphone in human history.
The campaign is transparently motivated by Trump’s furious flailing about as special counsel Robert Mueller turns over ever more rocks in his presidential campaign, his family business and in Russia.
A President with capacity for shame would at least go through the motions of pretending that a personnel decision this momentous was motivated by something other than a personal vendetta. Because Trump is Trump, he couldn’t help tweeting an end-zone dance complete with a gratuitous dig aimed at “Sanctimonious James Comey.”
The Trumpworld tinfoil-hat conspiracy theory is roughly that “deep state” denizen McCabe, whose wife is (gasp!) a Democrat, bent or broke rules to protect Hillary Clinton from prosecution after she used a private email server for public business.
And leaked to the media about an ongoing investigation.
Highly inconvenient fact: The internal FBI investigation reportedly faults McCabe for disclosures to the media that fed a negative article about Clinton and the Obama administration Justice Department.
Precisely what career FBI officials found in their internal probe, which Sessions cited as justification for McCabe’s termination, matters.
But a President who is plainly petrified about where the probe into Russian election meddling is headed, who lashed out at all who seek to find the truth, just gave the American people every reason to believe he forced the firing of a public servant in further effort to obstruct the investigation.