House Judiciary and Oversight committee member Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) told Fox News yesterday that he wouldn’t be surprised if former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn’s conviction is overturned.
“I would not be surprised a bit if the conviction of Flynn is overturned because of the Justice Department FBI’s misconduct,” Issa said to Maria Bartiromo.
“When the FBI and the Department of Justice lies to someone and tricks them into making statements, and then charges them with a lie they entrapped them. This is conduct that we haven’t seen in a long time,” he continued.
Issa was referring to the shocking memo from Flynn’s attorneys last week which stated the FBI interviewed the three-star general under questionable pretenses and did not disclose to him the severity of the consequences if he lied to the agents because they wanted him to be “relaxed.”
That FBI interview eventually led to Flynn’s pleading guilty to lying to the FBI.
Former FBI Director James Comey was in charge at the time of the Flynn interview and will testify before Congress again today behind closed doors. He is expected to address these latest revelations in the Flynn case.
Congress will also press him on his disturbing comments–which came after his December 7 testimony–in which he told NBC’s Nicolle Wallace that he wouldn’t have “gotten away” with the Flynn interview if it was done in a “more organized administration.”
In a forum on December 9, Wallace said to Comey, “It’s hard to imagine two FBI agents ending up in the State Room. How did that happen?”
“I sent them,” said Comey. “Something we’ve, I probably wouldn’t have done or maybe gotten away with in a more organized investigation, a more organized administration.”
He continued, “So if the FBI wanted to send agents into the White House itself to interview a senior official, you would work through the White House counsel and there would be discussions and approvals and it would be there. I thought, ‘It’s early enough, let’s just send a couple of guys over.’”
Issa also told Bartiromo that he believed Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein will still testify before Congress prior to the Democratic leadership takeover in the new year.
“I talked to Chairman Goodlatte. He is still working on it,” he said of the possibility of Rosenstein’s testimony. “Rosenstein would like to avoid it, but I think we’ll get him,” he said.
