A leak from McCabe’s legal team to their Lawfare ally at Politico, Natasha Bertrand, ends with a spectacular fail; highlighting a series of events entirely apropos of the McCabe character. This is just too darned funny.
Andrew McCabe’s legal team tell Politico journalist Natasha Bertrand that Obama officials were lined up to speak as character witnesses in his defense. To support their claim team McCabe leak’s an email written to the DOJ. Ms. Bertrand then writes an article:
(Politico) A cavalcade of Obama-era national security leaders have committed to testify on behalf of former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe should he face trial over allegations that he misled officials about leaks to the media.[…] If McCabe ultimately does face charges, he’ll have some big names lined up as character witnesses. The high-ranking ex-officials who have committed to defending him include former Attorney General Eric Holder, former CIA Director John Brennan, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and former national security adviser Susan Rice.
Mary McCord, a career DOJ attorney who oversaw the government’s Russia probe as acting head of the DOJ’s National Security Division, and David Cohen, the No. 2 at the CIA from 2015 to 2017, are also lined up to speak on McCabe’s behalf.McCabe’s legal team previously asked DOJ to overrule the prosecutors’ indictment recommendation, but were rebuffed, according to a person familiar with the matter. The lawyers wrote an 11-page legal analysis, entitled “Reasons Not To Prosecute Andrew McCabe,” as part of their effort to convince DOJ not to bring charges. (read more)
Immediately after publishing the article, Ms. Bertrand began receiving some rather snarky responses. John Brennan, James Clapper, Eric Holder and Susan Rice will appear as character witnesses? Seriously?
The team outlined by McCabe’s lawyers are notoriously well known public fibbers themselves including: CIA Director John Brennan (who lied to congress about spying on the Senate intelligence committee); DNI James Clapper (who lied about the NSA gathering metadata on Americans); former AG Eric Holder (who was held in contempt of congress for lying); and Susan Rice (infamous for lying about the Benghazi YouTube video).
The public responses to Ms. Bertrand’s propaganda article on behalf of her Lawfare allies was immediate, pointed and quite accurate. However, a few hours later, Ms. Bertrand had to walk-back the entire premise of her article:
It would appear the claims made by Andrew McCabe; which were based on communications also shared with potential DOJ prosecutors; were made without ever contacting Brennan, Clapper, Holder and Rice for their consent.
Yes, that’s correct. Andrew McCabe, who is being accused of lying under oath, lied about the production of character witnesses who the defense claimed were going to speak about McCabe’s integrity. In essence, he lied about the character witnesses.
You just can’t make this stuff up folks.
An epic fail, based on lies, entirely apropos of the character of Andrew McCabe.