Monday, moments after the long-anticipated Durham report about the Department of Justice and FBI probe into allegations the Trump 2016 presidential campaign colluded with the Russian government to win the presidency, CNN’s “The Lead” host Jake Tapper weighed in on the results.
Tapper acknowledged to his viewers the report, which criticized the FBI for the intelligence used to justify its investigation, was “devastating” to the agency and exonerated former President Donald Trump.
“[T]he years-long investigation is over,” he said. “And John Durham, the special counsel investigating whether there was any misconduct by the FBI in the Trump-Russia investigation just released his findings. For years, as you may recall, Donald Trump and his supporters pinned their hopes on the investigation by the former U.S. Attorney for Connecticut, John Durham named special counsel by Bill Barr, Trump and his allies arguing it would exonerate him from any hint of improper behavior regarding the Russian government’s attempts to interfere in the 2016 election.”
“‘Durham is coming,’ was the slogan and meme tweeted by Republican lawmakers and the president’s family, hinting that Durham would lead to bombshell indictments of those who investigated Trump,” Tapper continued. “Now, the bombshell indictments did not happen. Durham did get one minor court victory, two court losses. But President Trump appeared so confident of what Durham would find, he openedly pressured the special counsel to release the findings before the 2020 election. Regardless, the report is now here. It has dropped, and it might not have produced everything of what some Republicans hoped for — it is, regardless, devastating to the FBI, and to a degree it does exonerate Donald Trump.”
Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor
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