Comey says his assumption Clinton would win 'was a factor' in his email probe choices

last updated 15 April 2018

Former FBI Director James Comey said his assumption that then-candidate Hillary Clinton would win the 2016 election played a role in his decision-making about investigating the private email server she used as secretary of state. Clinton has blamed Comey for her loss.

"Wasn't the decision to reveal [further investigation to Congress shortly before the election] influenced by your assumption that Hillary Clinton was going to win, and your concern that, she wins, this comes out several weeks later and then that's taken by her opponents as a sign that she's an illegitimate president?" host George Stephanopoulos asked Comey.

"It must have been," Comey replied. "I don't remember consciously thinking about that, but it must have been. I was operating in a world where Hillary Clinton was going to beat Donald Trump. I'm sure that it was a factor. I don't remember spelling it out, but it had to have been. That she's going to be elected president, and if I hide this from the American people, she'll be illegitimate the moment she's elected, the moment this comes out."

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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.

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