The Department of Justice’s inspector general concluded that fired FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe Andrew George McCabeIn three years of Trump's presidency, who has branded whom? Trump knocks news of CNN hiring ex-FBI official McCabe Conservatives lash out at CNN for hiring Andrew McCabe MORE made a leak to the media “designed to advance his personal interests at the expense of Department leadership,” according to a copy of the report obtained by The Hill.

The report from Inspector General Michael Horowitz makes the case that McCabe authorized disclosures to the media that were designed to combat the perception that he had a conflict of interest in overseeing dual FBI investigations related to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham ClintonWarren endorses Texas Democrat Cuellar's primary challenger Ten notable Democrats who do not favor impeachment Krystal Ball: Warren's Hillary connections revealed?; Saagar Enjeti: End the wars MORE.

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“We concluded that McCabe’s decision to confirm the existence of the [Clinton Foundation] Investigation through an anonymously sourced quote, recounting the content of a phone call with a senior Department official in a manner designed to advance his personal interests at the expense of Department leadership, was clearly not within the public interest exception,” Horowitz wrote.



McCabe has disputed the charges as politically motivated. His attorney responded immediately on Friday that the report “utterly failed to support the decision to terminate Mr. McCabe.”



Michael Bromwich, McCabe’s attorney, also blasted the process by which he was terminated as “unprecedented, unseemly and cruel.”



The press disclosures in question were made to Wall Street Journal reporter Devlin Barrett shortly after he wrote a story detailing political donations from Clinton ally and former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe to the failed state Senate campaign of McCabe’s wife, Jill.



At the time, the story created a political uproar about McCabe’s impartiality.



In response to follow-up questions from Barrett, McCabe authorized two officials to discuss with Barrett “issues related to the FBI’s Clinton Foundation investigation.”



The disclosure — which was made by staff for McCabe — recounted McCabe’s version of a conversation with a Justice Department official about the investigation, in which McCabe says he pushed back on concerns about FBI agents taking “overt steps” during the presidential campaign.



“Are you telling me that I need to shut down a validly-predicated investigation,” McCabe says he said.



According to the Horowitz report, the disclosures were in part designed “to rebut a narrative that … questioned McCabe’s impartiality in overseeing FBI investigations involving former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and claimed that McCabe had ordered the termination of the [Clinton Foundation] Investigation due to Department of Justice pressure.”



The disclosure to Barrett, the report states, “effectively confirmed the existence” of the Clinton Foundation investigation — something then-Director James Comey James Brien ComeyGraham calls on Barr to declassify files on DOJ watchdog's Russia probe Trump ramps up Twitter offensive as Dorian approaches Florida Trump suggests watchdog report shows Mueller probe was 'illegal' MORE was at that point refusing to do.



According to the report, McCabe said that he did not view the disclosures to Barrett as confirming the existence of the investigation because the purpose was to demonstrate the FBI’s independence and “there really wasn’t any discussion of the case, of the merits of the case, the targets and subjects of the case.”



At the time, Republicans were concerned that the Obama-era Justice Department, led by then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch, was putting pressure on the bureau to shut down the Clinton probes. Barrett, according to the report, had sources who were telling him McCabe had given an order to “stand down” on the investigation.



The IG found McCabe’s rationale for the disclosure unpersuasive.



“Had McCabe’s primary concern actually been to reassure the public that the FBI was pursuing the [Clinton Foundation] investigation despite the anonymous claims in the article, the way that the FBI and the Department would usually accomplish that goal is through a public statement reassuring the public that the FBI is investigating the matter,” it reads.



After the story ran, the report states, McCabe led Comey to believe that he had not authorized the disclosures that lead to Barrett’s story and did not know who did. He allegedly made the same statement to internal investigators when questioned under oath months later.



“I don’t remember exactly how, but I remember some form or fashion and it could have been like ‘can you believe this crap? How does this stuff get out’ kind of thing?” Comey told investigators. “But I took from whatever communication we had that he wasn’t involved in it.”



According to McCabe, he told Comey that he had authorized the phone call with Barrett — something that as deputy director, he had the inherent authority to do if it was in the public interest.



“We found it extremely unlikely, as McCabe now claims, that he not only told Comey about his decision to authorize the disclosure, but that Comey thought it was a ‘good’ idea for McCabe to have taken that action,” the report states, noting that at the time McCabe authorized the disclosure and says he informed Comey, the issue of his recusal from the investigation was being discussed internally.



According to Horowitz’s report, McCabe also gave conflicting accounts to the inspector general’s investigators, at one point correcting a testimony to say that he believed he “may have authorized” the two officials to speak to Barrett, after he learned that the IG had texts messages that would “enable the OIG to soon learn the truth.”



McCabe’s lawyer in his statement said that “at all times, [McCabe] told the truth to the best of his ability.”



“This allegation is built on the shaky foundation of the allegations that he lacked candor in his dealings with Director Comey, [the FBI’s Inspection Division], and the OIG. What is entirely missing from the OIG’s report is any evidence of a motive for Mr. McCabe to do anything but tell the truth about this matter."



The main finding in the report — lack of candor related to the Wall Street Journal disclosures — was already publicly known, although it fleshes out further details.



It reveals that McCabe on Nov. 1 — just days before the election — recused himself from both the Clinton Foundation investigation and the investigation into Clinton’s private email server, which had been effectively reopened just days before.



At that point, according to the IG report, Comey had excluded McCabe from a phone call related to a new tranche of Clinton emails found days before the election, “out of an abundance of caution because of appearance issues” following the story about McCabe’s wife.



In a separate letter to Senate Judiciary Chairman Charles Grassley Charles (Chuck) Ernest GrassleyOvernight Health Care: Public's view of drug companies sinks to record low in poll | NYC declares end to measles outbreak | Health advocates fear Planned Parenthood funding loss could worsen STD crisis Texas Democrat wants Mexico to address highway security before vote on revised trade deal Congress set for chaotic fall sprint MORE (R-Iowa), Horowitz also revealed that his investigation into McCabe’s misconduct did not originate as part of the IG’s broader review into department decision-making during the 2016 election.

Instead, Horowitz says, it arose from a referral from the FBI’s Inspection Division, an internal watchdog responsible for maintaining the integrity of its investigations.

McCabe was dismissed by Attorney General Jeff Sessions Jefferson (Jeff) Beauregard SessionsSen. Doug Jones launches reelection bid in Alabama Advocates doubt Trump DEA will ease rules on marijuana research Nadler tees up post-recess showdown with Trump MORE in March after the FBI's Office of Professional Responsibility found that the 20-year veteran made an unauthorized disclosure to the news media and "lacked candor — including under oath — on multiple occasions."

President Trump Donald John TrumpTrump awards Medal of Valor, civilian honors to responders in Dayton and El Paso shootings Texas Democrats unveil 'path to victory' plan for 2020 The Hill's 12:30 Report: Congress returns with gun violence, funding atop agenda MORE immediately celebrated the report on Twitter, tweeting that the findings are a “total disaster.”

“He LIED! LIED! LIED! McCabe was totally controlled by Comey - McCabe is Comey!! No collusion, all made up by this den of thieves and lowlifes!”</s>
• The Department of Justice's inspector general released the findings of an internal investigation into Andrew McCabe, the former FBI deputy director.
• The Office of the Inspector General found at least four instances in which McCabe "lacked candor" when discussing his decision to authorize disclosures to the media about the FBI's investigation into the Clinton Foundation.
• The report concluded that "McCabe's decision to confirm the existence of the [Clinton Foundation] Investigation through an anonymously sourced quote ... was clearly not within the public interest exception."

The Department of Justice inspector general released on Friday its findings of an internal investigation into Andrew McCabe, the former FBI deputy director.

McCabe was forced out of the FBI earlier this year as the inspector general was putting together the report, which centers on his approval of disclosures to the media in October 2016 related to the bureau's investigation into the Clinton Foundation.

The inspector general, Michael Horowitz, concluded in Friday's report that McCabe was not forthcoming during his office's review.

When Horowitz informed the FBI's Office of Professional Responsibility about his findings last month, it recommended Attorney General Jeff Sessions fire McCabe, which Sessions did. McCabe's ouster came two days before he was set to retire.

President Donald Trump, who leveled a string of scathing and public attacks before and after McCabe's firing, weighed in on the report shortly after it was released Friday.

"DOJ just issued the McCabe report — which is a total disaster," Trump tweeted. "He LIED! LIED! LIED! McCabe was totally controlled by Comey — McCabe is Comey!! No collusion, all made up by this den of thieves and lowlifes!"

Meanwhile, Democratic lawmakers who have been concerned that Trump will use the OIG's report to bolster his attempts to discredit the Russia investigation pointed out that it centers on McCabe and is not connected Robert Mueller, the special counsel leading that inquiry.

DOJ internal watchdog: McCabe 'lacked candor' in at least 4 instances

The Wall Street Journal article at the center of the OIG's inquiry into McCabe was published on October 30, 2016, two days after James Comey, the FBI director at the time, announced in a letter to Congress that the bureau was reopening the investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server while she was secretary of state.

The article was a detailed account of internal strife within the top ranks of the DOJ about how to proceed after FBI agents investigating Anthony Weiner, the former New York congressman, discovered 650,000 emails on his laptop that could have been sent to or received from Clinton's private email server.

The reporter who wrote The Journal's article, Devlin Barrett, was in touch with two top FBI officials on the phone two days before the story broke, according to text messages released in February.

The officials were Lisa Page, an FBI lawyer who often worked with McCabe, and Michael Kortan, an FBI spokesman. The OIG report refers to Page and Kortan as "Special Counsel" and "then-Assistant Director for Public Affairs."

While law-enforcement officials often speak to the press on background to provide more complete details about a story, they are prohibited from disclosing information about ongoing investigations.

The inspector general found that McCabe's authorization of disclosures to the media regarding the Clinton Foundation investigation "effectively confirmed the existence" of the inquiry, something Comey "had previously refused to do."

The report also listed at least four instances in which McCabe "lacked candor" when discussing the disclosures while he was under oath.

In one instance, the report said, McCabe led Comey to believe, after the article was published, that he had not authorized the disclosures to The Journal and did not know who did.

McCabe made similar statements when internal FBI investigators questioned him about the disclosures on May 9, the report said.

A little over two months later, according to the report, McCabe told the OIG under oath that he was not aware Page had been authorized to speak to reporters about the Clinton Foundation investigation and that he could not say where Page was or what she was doing in the days before The Journal published the article.

Lastly, the report said McCabe contradicted his previous statements while testifying before the OIG on November 29 when he acknowledged he had authorized the media disclosures.

According to the report, he "stated that he told Comey on October 31, 2016, that he had authorized the disclosure" to The Journal and denied telling FBI investigators on May 9 that he had not authorized a disclosure to The Journal about his phone call with the principal assistant deputy attorney general, details of which were included in the article.

The inspector general also found that during his November 29 testimony, McCabe lacked candor when he described the manner in which he had been questioned by the internal investigators on May 9.

"We concluded that McCabe's decision to confirm the existence of the [Clinton Foundation] Investigation through an anonymously sourced quote, recounting the content of a phone call with a senior Department official in a manner designed to advance his personal interests at the expense of Department leadership, was clearly not within the public interest exception," the inspector general's report said.

McCabe stepped down as deputy director in January after FBI Director Christopher Wray briefed him on the impending report about his conduct.

The deputy director's ouster followed a string of public attacks leveled by President Donald Trump, accusing him of putting his thumb on the scale in Clinton's favor.

Trump's attacks were based on information in a separate Journal article published one week before the one on October 30 and written by Barrett focusing on an unsuccessful 2015 run for a Virginia Senate seat by McCabe's wife, Jill McCabe.

The Journal reported on October 24, 2016, that her campaign received $675,000 in donations from the Virginia Democratic Party and Common Good VA, the super PAC run by Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe, a longtime Clinton supporter.

According to the inspector general's report, Barrett emailed Kortan and the Office of Public Affairs about a follow-up story he was working on, saying he was told McCabe gave instructions on how to proceed with the Clinton Foundation investigation that summer, "given that it was the height of election season and the FBI did not want to make a lot of overt moves that could be seen as going after [Clinton] or drawing attention to the probe."

When Barrett asked the office to comment on the accuracy of the description, McCabe instructed Page to provide information to Barrett for the follow-up story, which resulted in the October 30 article.

The inspector general also found a discrepancy in descriptions by two officials — one of them McCabe — of an instance in which McCabe is said to have discussed recusing himself from the Clinton Foundation investigation.

The report cites testimony by the "New York Assistant Director In Charge" and an email he sent to himself in which McCabe indicated to him and an FBI executive assistant director that he would recuse himself from the investigation and told the two men he "may make a more formal decision at a later time."

The report says the assistant director later testified to the OIG that McCabe "couched it as like, hey, this is not final ... I don't know, I think he says he still has to talk about it."

The assistant director said he clarified with McCabe that he would begin reporting to the executive assistant director regarding the investigation.

But according to the OIG's report, McCabe told the internal watchdog that he did not recall such a conversation.

"I suppose it's possible that I may have referred to the concept if that was being discussed generally at the time," McCabe said, per the report. "But I would not have said to [NY-ADIC], like, I'm thinking about recusing."</s>In a long-awaited report laying out what Attorney General Jeff Sessions says led him to fire the FBI’s former deputy director, Andrew McCabe, just two days before his planned retirement, the Justice Department’s internal watchdog accuses McCabe of “lacking candor” on multiple occasions and violating FBI policy when he authorized the disclosure of sensitive investigative information to a reporter.

Representatives for McCabe called all of those findings “false,” saying much of the report “is based on a deeply flawed assessment of the evidence against Mr. McCabe.”

The report by Inspector General Michael Horowitz was released publicly on Friday, less than one month after Sessions said his private review of the report led him to conclude McCabe should be removed from government immediately.

McCabe has become a frequent target of criticism from President Donald Trump and Republican lawmakers, who allege that McCabe's time at the top of the FBI was emblematic of political bias in the FBI's law enforcement work.

Shortly after the report was released Trump tweeted that McCabe "LIED!, LIED!, LIED!"

In October 2016, the Wall Street Journal published an article that questioned whether McCabe was hampering the federal probe of the Clinton Foundation.

Ahead of the story's publication, McCabe authorized an FBI spokesman and FBI attorney to speak with the newspaper about the probe and his own efforts to keep it moving forward, including the contents of a phone call months earlier about the matter with a senior Justice Department official, the report released Friday said.

“Among the purposes of the disclosure was to rebut a narrative that had been developing … that questioned McCabe’s impartiality in overseeing FBI investigations involving former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton,” according to the report.

Meanwhile, McCabe, first head of the FBI field office in New York and then in Washington, told the inspector general’s office that after the Wall Street Journal report was published, “they each received calls from McCabe admonishing them for leaks contained in the” article, the report said. “At no time did McCabe disclose to either of them that McCabe had authorized [an FBI attorney] to disclose information … to the WSJ reporter.”

The day after the article’s publication, McCabe spoke face-to-face with Comey, who expressed concern about information contained in the news article, according to the inspector general's report. According to what McCabe later told the internal investigator, he informed Comey that he had authorized the FBI spokesman and FBI attorney to disclose details about his previous phone call with a senior Justice Department official. Comey disputed that telling investigators he was “very concerned” that the article included “sensitive FBI information,” and that McCabe “definitely did not tell me that he authorized” the disclosure, according to the report.

The inspector general began investigating McCabe in August 2017, after the FBI’s Inspection Division told the inspector general’s office that the deputy director may have lacked candor when questioned about his role in disclosing sensitive information to a reporter.

In its report released Friday, the inspector general’s office said McCabe “lacked candor” in July 2017 when he told investigators – under oath – “that he was not aware of [the FBI attorney] having been authorized to speak to reporters around October 30,” and he “lacked candor” again four months later when he acknowledged authorizing the disclosure but “stated that he told Comey on October 31, 2016, that he had authorized the disclosure to the WSJ.”

Representatives for McCabe noted that two business days after speaking with investigators in July 2017, McCabe contacted the inspector general’s office “and corrected his prior statements.”

“Mr. McCabe thought further about his discussion with the OIG investigators and realized that he needed to correct the record,” they said in a “factsheet” distributed to reported.

Nevertheless, the inspector general also concluded that McCabe “lacked candor” in May 2017 when interviewed by officials from the FBI’s Inspection Division. He told them he had not authorized the disclosure to the Wall Street Journal and did not know who did, the report said.

The representatives for McCabe said the inspector general’s “account of Mr. McCabe’s interactions with the … investigators is incomplete and misleading.”

“Mr. McCabe never deliberately misled Inspection Division (INSD) investigators,” the “factsheet” said. “[W]hen Mr. McCabe turned back to the draft statement they prepared for him several months later, he declined to sign it and instead contacted INSD to correct the inaccurate facts about his relationship to the WSJ article.”

Beyond the accuracy of McCabe’s statements to investigators, the inspector general’s report released Friday also took sharp issue with McCabe’s move to authorize the media disclosure in the first place.

“[W]e concluded that McCabe’s decision to confirm the existence of the [Clinton Foundation] Investigation through an anonymously sourced quote, recounting the content of a phone call with a senior Department official in a manner designed to advance his personal interests at the expense of Department leadership, was clearly not within the public interest exception,” the report said.

“We therefore concluded that McCabe’s disclosure of the existence of an ongoing investigation in this manner violated the FBI’s and the Department’s media policy and constituted misconduct.”

But representatives for McCabe said he “had full authority to authorize sharing information with the media” as deputy director.

“Their interaction with the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) was not done in secret: it took place over the course of several days and others knew of it, including Director Comey. It was done to protect the institutional reputation of the FBI as a non-political and professional investigative agency, and therefore was squarely within the public interest exception to the FBI’s prohibition on sharing sensitive material,” a “factsheet” from McCabe’s representatives said.

In 2015, while McCabe was head of the FBI's Washington Field Office, his wife ran for state senate in Virginia as a Democrat. She lost the election in November 2015, and three months later McCabe became deputy director, giving him an oversight role in the investigation of Clinton's use of a private email server as secretary of state. After the Wall Street Journal story was published in October 2016, McCabe recused himself from the Clinton matter.

McCabe first joined the FBI in 1996, investigating organized crime cases in New York. Over the next several years, he shifted his focus to rooting out international terrorists, and in 2012 he became the head of the FBI's counterterrorism division at headquarters in Washington.

In October 2013, McCabe took over the FBI's entire national security branch, and the next year he moved to become the assistant director in charge of the FBI's Washington Field Office.

McCabe stepped down as deputy director in January, and he was fired by Sessions in May.

“The rush to judgment – and the rush to terminate Mr. McCabe – were unprecedented, unseemly, and cruel,” Michael Brownwich, an attorney for McCabe, said in a statement. “His treatment was far more harsh and far less fair than he deserved, and his reward for the loyalty he showed to his country over the course of his career was a truncated form of administrative due process, including the lack of any right to appeal outside the Department of Justice.”

Responding to Trump's Friday tweet, McCabe lawyer Bromwich tweeted: "Thank you for providing even more material for the defamation suit we are actively considering filing against you and your colleagues. Stay tuned."

"Today's Inspector General report confirms FBI Deputy Director McCabe's firing was justified. The second in command at our nation's premiere law enforcement agency should be the epitome of fidelity, bravery and integrity. The Inspector General found not only did McCabe divulge sensitive information, he did it without the permission, authority, or knowledge of his supervisor."</s>
• The Department of Justice's inspector general released the findings from an internal investigation into former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe.
• The Office of the Inspector General found four instances during which it said McCabe "lacked candor" when discussing his decision to authorize disclosures to the media about the FBI's investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the Clinton Foundation.
• The report concluded that "McCabe’s decision to confirm the existence of the [Clinton] Investigation through an anonymously sourced quote … in a manner designed to advance his personal interests at the expense of department leadership, was clearly not within the public interest exception."

The Department of Justice’s inspector general released on Friday findings from an internal investigation into fired FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe.

McCabe was forced out of the FBI earlier this year as the Office of the Inspector General was putting together the report, which centers on his approval of disclosures to the media in October 2016 related to the bureau's Hillary Clinton email probe.

The inspector general, Michael Horowitz, concluded in Friday’s report that McCabe was not forthcoming during his office's review. When Horowitz informed the FBI Office of Professional Responsibility about his findings last month, it recommended Attorney General Jeff Sessions fire McCabe, which Sessions then did last month. McCabe's ouster came two days before he was set to retire.

The Wall Street Journal article at the center of the OIG's inquiry into McCabe was published on October 30, 2016, two days after then-FBI Director James Comey announced in a letter to Congress that the bureau was reopening its investigation into Clinton's use of a private email server.

The article was a highly detailed account of internal strife within the top ranks of the DOJ about how to proceed after FBI agents investigating former New York congressman Anthony Weiner discovered 650,000 emails on his laptop that could have been sent to or from Clinton's private email server.

The reporter who wrote The Journal's article, Devlin Barrett, was in touch with two top FBI officials on the phone two days before the story broke, according to text messages released in February. The officials were FBI lawyer Lisa Page, who often worked with McCabe, and then-FBI spokesman Michael Kortan.

While law-enforcement officials often speak to the press on background in order to provide more complete details about an ongoing story, they are prohibited from revealing information about ongoing investigations, like the Clinton email probe.

The OIG found that McCabe’s authorization of disclosures to the media regarding the Clinton email investigation “effectively confirmed the existence” of the probe, “which then-FBI Director Comey had previously refused to do.”

DOJ internal watchdog: McCabe 'lacked candor' in at least 4 instances

The report also listed at least four instances in which McCabe "lacked candor" when discussing the disclosures while he was under oath.

In one instance, the report said, McCabe lacked candor when he led Comey to believe, after the article was published, that he had not authorized the disclosures to the Journal and did not know he did.

McCabe made similar statements when internal FBI investigators questioned him about the disclosures on May 9, 2017, the report said.

A little over two months later, the report found that McCabe lacked candor when he testified under oath to the OIG that he was not aware Page had been authorized to speak to reporters about the Clinton investigation, and that he could not say where Page was or what she was doing in the days immediately prior to when the Journal published its October 30 piece.

Lastly, the report said McCabe contradicted his previous statements when he acknowledged he had authorized the media disclosures while testifying before the OIG on November 29, 2017. He additionally "lacked candor" when he "stated that he told Comey on October 31, 2016, that he had authorized the disclosure to the WSJ," and when he denied telling internal FBI investigators on May 9 that he had not authorized a specific disclosure to the Journal about his phone call with the principal assistant deputy attorney general.

Details of the call were included in the October 30 Journal article.

The OIG also found that during his November 29 testimony, McCabe lacked candor when he described the manner in which he had been questioned by internal investigators on May 9.

"We concluded that McCabe’s decision to confirm the existence of the [Clinton] Investigation through an anonymously sourced quote … in a manner designed to advance his personal interests at the expense of department leadership, was clearly not within the public interest exception," the inspector general's report said.

McCabe stepped down as deputy director in January after FBI Director Christopher Wray briefed him on the impending OIG report about his conduct.

The deputy director's ouster came following a string of public attacks President Donald Trump leveled against him, accusing him of putting his thumb on the scale in favor of Clinton.

Trump's attacks were based on information contained in a separate Wall Street Journal article published one week before the October 30. Barrett was the author of both.

McCabe's wife, Dr. Jill McCabe, mounted an unsuccessful run for a Virginia state Senate seat in 2015. The Journal reported on October 24, 2016 that her campaign received $675,000 in donations from the Virginia Democratic Party and from Common Good VA, the super PAC run by Democratic Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, a longtime Clinton supporter.

According to the OIG report, Barrett subsequently emailed the DOJ's Office of Public Affairs about a follow-up he was working on. Barrett told the OPA that he was told that McCabe gave himself instructions on how to proceed with the Clinton Foundation investigation that summer, "given that it was the height of election season and the FBI did not want to make a lot of overt moves that could be seen as going after [Clinton] or drawing attention to the probe."

When Barrett asked the OPA to comment on how accurate the description was, the report said McCabe instructed Page to provide information to Barrett for the follow-up story, which resulted in the October 30 article.</s>Andrew McCabe details the filing of civil forfeiture complaints in June. REUTERS/James Lawler Duggan

The Department of Justice's inspector general released on Friday findings from an internal investigation into fired FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe.

McCabe was forced out of the FBI earlier this year as the Office of the Inspector General was putting together the report, which centers on his approval of disclosures to the media in October 2016 related to the bureau's Hillary Clinton email probe.

The inspector general, Michael Horowitz, concluded in Friday's report that McCabe was not forthcoming during his office's review. When Horowitz informed the FBI Office of Professional Responsibility about his findings last month, it recommended Attorney General Jeff Sessions fire McCabe, which Sessions then did last month. McCabe's ouster came two days before he was set to retire.

The Wall Street Journal article at the center of the OIG's inquiry into McCabe was published on October 30, 2016, two days after then-FBI Director James Comey announced in a letter to Congress that the bureau was reopening its investigation into Clinton's use of a private email server.

The article was a highly detailed account of internal strife within the top ranks of the DOJ about how to proceed after FBI agents investigating former New York congressman Anthony Weiner discovered 650,000 emails on his laptop that could have been sent to or from Clinton's private email server.

The reporter who wrote The Journal's article, Devlin Barrett, was in touch with two top FBI officials on the phone two days before the story broke, according to text messages released in February. The officials were FBI lawyer Lisa Page, who often worked with McCabe, and then-FBI spokesman Michael Kortan.

While law-enforcement officials often speak to the press on background in order to provide more complete details about an ongoing story, they are prohibited from revealing information about ongoing investigations, like the Clinton email probe.

McCabe stepped down as deputy director in January after FBI Director Christopher Wray briefed him on the impending OIG report about his conduct.

The deputy director's ouster came following a string of public attacks President Donald Trump leveled against him, accusing him of putting his thumb on the scale in favor of Clinton.</s>The Justice Department inspector general found that former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe “lacked candor” on four occasions when discussing the disclosure of information for a Wall Street Journal article about the FBI’s Clinton Foundation investigation, according to a copy of the report obtained by CNN on Friday.

In addition, the inspector general determined that McCabe was not authorized to disclose the existence of the investigation because it was not within the department’s “public interest” exception for disclosing ongoing investigations. The inspector general said that the disclosure to the Journal was made “in a manner designed to advance his personal interests at the expense of department leadership.”

The instances the inspector general cited were McCabe’s conversations with federal investigators and also with then-FBI Director James Comey in October 2016.

The report from Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz, which was sent to Capitol Hill on Friday ahead of its expected public release, formed the basis of McCabe’s firing last month by Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

Horowitz wrote in a letter to Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley Friday he expected the report to be released in May, “absent any new additional developments.”

President Donald Trump seized on the new report Friday to attack McCabe on Twitter, which he also did in the lead-up to McCabe’s firing and immediately afterward.

“DOJ just issued the McCabe report – which is a total disaster,” Trump tweeted Friday. “He LIED! LIED! LIED! McCabe was totally controlled by Comey – McCabe is Comey!! No collusion, all made up by this den of thieves and lowlifes!”

In a statement responding to the report, McCabe’s attorney, Michael Bromwich, said the inspector general “utterly failed to support the decision to terminate Mr. McCabe.”

“In written submissions to the OIG and DOJ, we demonstrated that the charges were unsupported by the evidence and that the OIG’s conclusions and the FBI-OPR proposal to terminate Mr. McCabe were unjustified,” Bromwich said.

The 35-page inspector general report goes into detail in arguing McCabe intentionally misled internal FBI and inspector general investigators about whether he had authorized the disclosure of an August 2016 phone conversation regarding the FBI’s Clinton Foundation investigation to The Wall Street Journal. The report also says that McCabe told investigators he had informed Comey in October 2016 that he had authorized a discussion of the conversation, while Comey testified that he did not recall McCabe doing so.

“While the only direct evidence regarding this McCabe-Comey conversation were the recollections of the two participants, there is considerable circumstantial evidence and we concluded that the overwhelming weight of that evidence supported Comey’s version of the conversation,” the report states.

“Mr. McCabe’s recollection of discussions he had with Director Comey about this issue is extremely clear; Director Comey’s recollection is, by his own acknowledgment, not at all clear,” Bromwich said. “And yet two of the lack of candor allegations are based on Director Comey’s admittedly vague and uncertain recollection of those discussions.”

McCabe’s firing occurred less than two days before his planned retirement, denying him certain retirement benefits. The inspector general report on McCabe was forwarded to the FBI’s Office of Professional Responsibility, which is staffed by career officials and recommended McCabe’s dismissal.

McCabe responded to the firing by charging it was part of a larger effort from the Trump administration to discredit the FBI and special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.

“This attack on my credibility is one part of a larger effort not just to slander me personally, but to taint the FBI, law enforcement, and intelligence professionals more generally,” McCabe said in a statement last month.

Democrats have emphasized that McCabe’s dismissal has nothing to do with the special counsel’s investigation into Trump and Russia, while raising questions about the firing.

“The report issued by the Inspector General today has absolutely nothing to do with Special Counsel Mueller, Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein, the conduct of federal investigators so far, or the multiple indictments they have secured against Russian nationals and Trump campaign officials,” Rep. Jerry Nadler, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, said in a statement.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said the rush to fire McCabe before his retirement “casts a tremendous shadow over the integrity of this process.”

“I can’t disregard his actions, but I’m disappointed the context wasn’t given more weight,” she said in a statement.

But Republicans say the report shows McCabe’s firing was justified.

“The Inspector General found not only did McCabe divulge sensitive information, he did it without the permission, authority, or knowledge of his supervisor,” said House Oversight Chairman Trey Gowdy. “This report continues to call into question decisions made by FBI leadership in 2016 and 2017, which is why the Oversight and Judiciary Committees will continue our joint investigation into the matter.”

The report on McCabe is part of a larger investigation from Horowitz into the FBI’s handling of the 2016 investigation into Hillary Clinton’s email server.

That investigation is also expected to address the actions of Comey, whose upcoming book is already making waves and prompted Trump to call Comey a “weak and untruthful slime ball” in a tweet.

While the report is mostly focused on the disclosures in the Clinton Foundation investigation, it also sheds more light on his recusal in both the Clinton Foundation and Clinton email investigations.

The report states that Comey asked McCabe on October 27, 2016, to “drop off” a call about the Clinton emails found on former Rep. Anthony Weiner’s laptop, one day before Comey informed Congress the FBI was reopening the probe due to the new emails.

McCabe was “very unhappy” about being forced off the call, according to the report. Comey wanted him off the call out of an “abundance of caution” because of “appearance issues” following a Wall Street Journal article about political donations to his wife from former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, an ally of Clinton.

On November 1, McCabe informed FBI officials he was recusing himself.</s>Former FBI Director James Comey, who was fired by Trump in May, called the president 'unethical, and untethered to the truth,' according to excerpts from his memoir. — Reuters picWASHINGTON, April 14 — The US Department of Justice’s inspector general released a report yesterday concluding that former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe misled investigators about a decision to break with the agency’s standard policy and inform a journalist about a probe into the Clinton Foundation in 2016.

The highly anticipated report detailed an investigation that US Attorney General Jeff Sessions cited when he fired McCabe last month, hours before the 21-year veteran of the Federal Bureau of Investigation was set to retire and receive his full pension.

Responding to the inspector general’s report, McCabe said he believed repeated calls by President Donald Trump to fire him had prompted a rush to judgment and an unfair probe into his conduct. He said he was authorised to share the information with reporters and had not intentionally misled anyone.

“The termination of Mr. McCabe was completely unjustified. And the rush to fire him, at the goading of the president, was unworthy of the great traditions of the Department of Justice,” McCabe’s counsel said in the statement yesterday.

Trump portrayed the report’s findings as vindication of his criticism of McCabe and former FBI Director James Comey as biased for their roles in shepherding along a federal probe into alleged collusion between Russia and his 2016 campaign.

The report was released as advance copies of Comey’s new memoir were obtained by the press. Comey, who was fired by Trump in May, called the president “unethical, and untethered to the truth,” according to excerpts from the book.

The inspector general’s 39-page report found that McCabe should not have authorised FBI officials to speak with the press about the Clinton Foundation probe, as it broke with policy against disclosing an ongoing investigation. The report also concluded that McCabe was not upfront with investigators about the matter, including on three occasions when he was under oath.

“He LIED! LIED! LIED! McCabe was totally controlled by Comey — McCabe is Comey!!,” Trump tweeted yesterday in reference to the report on McCabe. “No collusion, all made up by this den of thieves and lowlifes!”

The report, written by Inspector General Michael Horowitz, said McCabe “lacked candor” in conversations with Comey and other officials about his green-lighting the sharing information with a Wall Street Journal reporter who was working on a story about an FBI investigation into the Clinton Foundation.

According to the report, the reporter told FBI officials he had heard that McCabe had given an order to “stand down” on the investigation ahead of the 2016 presidential election, which was days away.

McCabe then authorised telling the reporter that no such order had been given and to relay the contents of a conversation between McCabe and a Justice Department official in which McCabe pushed back against the official’s suggestion that no overt steps be taken during the campaign.

McCabe said he was authorised, as deputy director, to disclose information about the August 2016 call. The inspector general, in contrast, found that McCabe violated FBI policy by acknowledging the existence of a criminal investigation that was not public at the time.

The inspector general also concluded that McCabe initially had been untruthful about authorising the FBI officials to engage the reporter. This, according to the report, included not being upfront with Comey in a conversation the day after the article appeared and later misleading FBI inspectors.

In a detailed rebuttal to the report, McCabe said he had made Comey aware of what he was doing, and that the report showed that Comey’s recollection of their conversation was “fragmentary” and his statements about it “equivocal.”

McCabe said he never deliberately misled any investigators and described the allegations against him as the result of misunderstandings and “honest failures of recollection based on the swirl of events around him” at the time. — Reuters</s>A few weeks ago, the Justice Department’s inspector general rushed out a draft copy of its report on Andrew McCabe to Attorney General Jeff Sessions. Why? So that Sessions could fire McCabe 26 hours before he qualified for his full pension and retired.

Well, the final report has now been released and I’ve read it. But first, here are the background facts:
• As deputy director of the FBI, McCabe had oversight authority over all FBI investigations, including the Clinton email investigation and the Clinton Foundation investigation.
• A year earlier, McCabe’s wife had run as a Democrat for a state senate seat in Virginia. Like most Democratic candidates, she received money from a PAC controlled by Clinton pal Terry McAuliffe. During the 2016 presidential campaign, conservative media went berserk over this, claiming that McCabe had been influenced by his wife’s connections to go easy on Clinton.
• Near the end of the 2016 campaign, the Wall Street Journal ran an article implying that McCabe had also tried to slow walk the Clinton Foundation investigation.
• In fact, McCabe had done just the opposite: in a phone call with the Justice Department he had refused to allow any political interference with the investigation. A few days after the original article appeared, McCabe authorized an FBI press liason to tell this to the Journal on background for a follow-up article that appeared on October 30.

Everyone accepts this as the basic background of the case. What’s more, as deputy director, McCabe was authorized to speak to the press on background or to allow others to do it for him. The question is: did McCabe lie about authorizing this disclosure to the Journal? The inspector general says he did, and lays out the following timeline:
• October 31, 2016: McCabe speaks to FBI Director James Comey about the Journal article. McCabe says he told Comey what he had done. Comey says he didn’t.
• May 9, 2017: The FBI inspection division, which is investigating a series of leaks, talks to McCabe. McCabe says he doesn’t know where this particular leak came from.
• July 28, 2017: The DOJ inspector general interviews McCabe, who says he doesn’t know who authorized the press liason to talk to the Journal.
• August 1, 2017: McCabe calls the inspector general to change his testimony. He now says that he recalls authorizing the disclosure.
• August 18, 2017: The FBI inspection division re-interviews McCabe, who confirms that he authorized the disclosure.
• November 29: The inspector general interviews McCabe again. McCabe confirms yet again that he authorized the disclosure.

The inspector general’s report concludes that McCabe lied multiple times: to Comey (#1), to the FBI inspection division (#2), to the inspector general (#3), and finally on November 29 when he told the inspector general his version of the conversation with Comey (#6).

McCabe has defended himself against all the charges:
• He believes his recollection of the conversation with Comey is correct, and it’s Comey who is mistaken.
• He says that the May 9 interview was about an entirely different matter and touched on the Journal article only briefly. “That is reflected in the fact that in a 12-page draft statement prepared by INSD, the WSJ article occupied a single paragraph.” McCabe says he never meant to imply that he didn’t authorize the disclosure.
• He says the July 28 interview was primarily about the FBI’s overall handling of the Clinton email case. “The OIG investigators assured him they would not ask questions about matters that could involve him.” When they suddenly asked McCabe about the Journal article, “He attempted multiple times to end the discussion as quickly as possible.” That caused him to flub his response, and two days later he called back to correct his testimony.

I don’t know any more about this than anyone else, but McCabe’s defense sounds sort of sketchy. That said, this whole thing is over the most trivial and common kind of leak imaginable: a senior official defending himself and the bureau—truthfully—against a newspaper article that was objectively incorrect.¹ The information McCabe leaked was intended to defend both himself and the integrity of the FBI, and it was literally no more than a sentence or two that was completely harmless. The biggest charge is that McCabe’s leak effectively confirmed that the FBI was investigating the Clinton Foundation, but was anyone really in any doubt about that anyway?

I dunno. The inspector general didn’t believe McCabe’s story and concluded that he had “lacked candor.” Maybe that’s a firing offense no matter what the issue is and no matter who does it. But it sure sounds to me like the kind of thing that wouldn’t normally get a guy fired 26 hours before his retirement unless the president of the United States was gunning for him. Obviously Trump was, and he issued his usual unhinged gloating over the downfall of an enemy after the inspector general’s report was released:

¹And not just incorrect: it was part of a coordinated campaign of character assassination from a presidential campaign.</s>The Justice Department watchdog says fired FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe misled investigators over his role in a news media disclosure.

The finding is contained in an inspector general report obtained Friday by The Associated Press.

The inspector general's finding led FBI disciplinary officials to recommend that the Justice Department fire McCabe. Attorney General Jeff Sessions dismissed him last month two days before his scheduled retirement for what he described as a lack of candor.

McCabe has disputed that assessment, and issued a point-by-point rebuttal on Friday. He says that when he believed his answers to the inspector general were misunderstood, he went back and tried to correct them. His lawyer says the inspector general unfairly tried to conclude its work before McCabe could retire.</s>The long-anticipated Department of Justice Inspector General report critical of fired FBI Director Andrew McCabe is expected to be released Friday afternoon. It claims that McCabe "lacked candor" on multiple occasions in conversations with federal investigators, according to a copy of the report obtained by CBS News.

McCabe was fired by Attorney General Jeff Sessions last month, at the recommendation of FBI officials, ahead of the expected report. The inspector general began its work on the report more than a year ago, and the report has long been anticipated in Washington.

The inspector general's report claims that McCabe misled investigators about the FBI's contacts with the media.

McCabe has called his dismissal part of the "war" on the FBI, and wrote a lengthy op-ed in The Washington Post immediately after his dismissal.

In a Friday statement, McCabe's attorney Michael Bromwich disputed the inspector general's findings, saying that the rush to fire McCabe was "unprecedented, unseemly, and cruel."

"The core weakness of the OIG report is the lack of any understandable motive for his alleged wrongdoing," said the statement in part.

"It is undisputed that Mr. McCabe was one of three senior FBI officials authorized to share information with the media, including on sensitive investigative matters. He chose to exercise that authority in October 2016, during one of the most turbulent periods in the history of the Bureau, with the knowledge of Director Comey and other senior members of FBI management. His purpose was to protect the institutional reputation of the FBI against false claims, including that a sensitive investigation was being shut down for political reasons."
• None Report: Internal DOJ review expected to be critical of Andrew McCabe 



Mr. Trump is now lashing out at fired FBI Director James Comey, who is releasing a new book on his time at the FBI. Comey accuses the president of being "untethered to truth," and describes in detail his interactions with Mr. Trump.

Mr. Trump responded to Comey's book for the first time Friday, calling him a "LEAKER & LIAR" and saying he "should be prosecuted."

White House press secretary Sarah Sanders responded to the IG report by saying McCabe and Comey sound like "two peas in a pod."

"I haven't seen the full report but it sounds like two peas in a pod with McCabe and Comey," Sanders said in Friday's press briefing.

This is a developing story and will be updated.
The U.S. government releases a report by Inspector General Michael E. Horowitz that accuses former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe of improperly authorizing a media disclosure and "lack of candor" concerning this disclosure.