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The White House released newly declassified FBI memos showing that the bureau opened a 2017 counterintelligence investigation into whether President Donald Trump’s firing of James Comey was connected to Russia.
The investigation, codenamed «Oxferd Comma,» opened after Trump fired FBI Director James Comey in May 2017, according to the White House’s release. It is unclear as to why the word «Oxford» was seemingly misspelled.
The probe was launched due to national security concerns about whether Trump himself was a Russian asset, the documents allege.
Investigators sought to determine whether Trump was «directed by, controlled by, and/or coordinated activities with, the Russian Federation in a manner constituting a threat to the national security of the United States and/or a violation of federal criminal statutes,» according an FBI memo on May 16, 2017, jump-starting the investigation.
«In addition, this investigation will also seek to determine whether President Trump and others yet to be named obstructed and/or conspiracy to obstruct any associated FBI investigation,» the same memo added.
Comey was appointed by then-President Barack Obama, serving as FBI Director from 2013 to 2017.
He oversaw the launch of the «Crossfire Hurricane» investigation in July 2016 after receiving information that Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos had suggested Russia possessed damaging information about Hillary Clinton.
Former FBI Director James Comey. (Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images)
Comey also ran an investigation into Clinton about the use of her private email servers and sent a letter to Congress days before the 2016 election saying the FBI had discovered emails that «appear to be pertinent.»
Trump fired Comey after taking office, with the administration initially citing his handling of the Clinton email investigation as reason for losing his job.
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A week after Comey’s firing, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appointed Robert Mueller as Special Counsel to take over and broaden the existing FBI «Crossfire Hurricane» investigation.
Mueller found in April 2019 that the Russian government sought to influence the election through a social media disinformation campaign and by hacking and releasing Democratic Party emails. His report stated that the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government.
After Mueller’s probe was set to be finalized, memos on the «Oxferd Comma» investigation were closed on April 9, 2019.
Subsequently, Attorney General William Barr appointed John Durham to review how the FBI had initiated the Russia investigation, which in 2023 concluded that the Bureau lacked sufficient factual basis to open the full Crossfire Hurricane investigation and exhibited bias by departing from its usual standards.
Comey was appointed by then-President Barack Obama, serving as FBI Director from 2013 to 2017. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters)
New documents on a declassified annex to Durham’s final report show that officials had concerns rgarding Clinton’s campaign plan to smear then-candidate Trump by connecting him to Russia.
«Raising the theme of «Putin’s support for Trump» to the level of the Olympics scandal would divert the constituents’ attention from the investigation of Clinton’s compromised electronic correspondence,» reads the annex.
Included in the annex is a 2016 letter from Leonard Benardo, who worked for the Soros-founded philanthropic network Open Society Foundations and had business in Moscow in the 1980s.
«Julie says it will be a long-term affair to demonize Putin and Trump. Now it is good for a post-convention bounce. Later the FBI will put more oil into the fire,» wrote Benardo.
The ‘Julie’ that Benardo references appears to be Clinton foreign policy advisor Julianne Smith, according to the report appendix.
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Fox News Digital reached out to the White House for additional comment on Wednesday.
This is a breaking news story and will be updated.
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