“It is stunning that the FBI ‘found’ these Clinton-Lynch tarmac records only after we caught the agency hiding them in another lawsuit,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton declared, in reaction to the FBI finding 30 pages of documents relative to the infamous June 27, 2016 meeting between former President Bill Clinton (right) and then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch (left) on the tarmac at the airport in Phoenix, Arizona. The FBI informed Judicial Watch of the documents’ existence late last week.
Last October (right before the presidential election between Clinton’s wife, Hillary, and Donald Trump) the FBI had told Judicial Watch they had no records related to that meeting. But we now know because of a separate lawsuit filed by Judicial Watch that some of the officials of the Justice Department had been in contact with officials of the FBI concerning the supposedly chance encounter.
Interestingly, lying to the FBI in a criminal matter is a crime; the FBI lying to the American citizens is not.
The significance of the meeting was that it occurred only about a week before FBI Director James Comey announced that he was advising the Justice Department that no prosecutor could have a case to make against Mrs. Clinton. And had it not been for a local reporter in Arizona breaking the story of the meeting, we might never have known it took place.
At the time, both Lynch and former President Clinton dismissed the idea that the two even discussed the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s e-mail scandal. They said Clinton got onto the plane to speak with Lynch and discussed only his grandchildren. Lynch later told reporters, “I did see President Clinton at the Phoenix airport as I was leaving, and he spoke to myself and my husband on the plane. Our conversation was a great deal about his grandchildren. It was primarily social and about our travels.” (Emphasis added.)
Primarily? This sounds like lawyer Lynch was using a subjective term. After all, who is to judge whether a conversation was “primarily” social? One would think an enterprising journalist would have asked if the investigation of Clinton’s wife was discussed.
FBI Director Comey has told Congress that Lynch directed him to describe the e-mail probe as a “matter,” rather than an “investigation.”
Then, Hillary Clinton’s husband met clandestinely with Lynch in Arizona. Comey said, “That was one of the bricks in the load that I needed to step away from the department.” Comey complained that Lynch’s Justice Department was aligning its remarks with the way the Clinton campaign was addressing the investigation.
“That gave me a queasy feeling,” Comey added. For her part, Lynch said that she regretted the meeting, and if she had it to do over, she would not do it.
It has not been revealed what is in the documents, but the FBI has said it will release them to Judicial Watch by the end of November.
“The FBI is out of control,” Fitton responded. “Judicial Watch will continue to press for answers about the FBI’s document games in court. In the meantime, the FBI should stop the stonewall and release these new records immediately.”
In fact, Fitton argued, “The fact they just ‘found’ them is yet another scandal.”
Can one imagine the reaction of the left-wing media had one of Trump’s sons or daughters, or his son-in-law, met secretly with Attorney General Jeff Sessions, a week before it was announced that all of the “Russia”-related innuendos amounted to nothing and the probe was concluded? Of course, unlike Lynch, Sessions has recused himself in Russia’s alleged collusion with Trump’s campaign over the 2016 election.
Would the media have accepted the defense that Sessions and a son or daughter of Trump were just discussing Trump’s grandchildren?
Judicial Watch first filed a Freedom of Information (FOIA) request in July 2016 asking for “all records of communications between any agent, employee, or representative” of the FBI concerning the June 27, 2016 meeting in Arizona between Lynch and Clinton. The Justice Department did not comply with that request.
For his part, Fitton is disappointed in the Trump Justice Department’s slow response. “President Trump should order the full and immediate release of these materials,” he insisted.
Does anyone doubt that a Democrat president would have had the Justice Department quickly release documents about a Republican administration?
Photo of Loretta Lynch: Official government photo; photo of Bill Clinton: Gage Skidmore
