DeWit: Former Attorney General Loretta Lynch big loser of Comey hearing
Jun 9, 2017, 3:20 PM | Updated: Jun 11, 2017, 12:38 pm
(AP Photos)
(AP Photos)
PHOENIX — Following the Senate hearing for former FBI Director James Comey Thursday, Arizona Treasurer Jeff DeWit shared some of his reactions.
“Fascinating to watch, political theater at its best,” DeWit said on KTAR News 92.3 FM’s Bruce St. James and Pamela Hughes show Friday.
DeWit was asked who he believe came out the worst and he said it was former Attorney General Loretta Lynch.
“I think the biggest loser that came out of that was Loretta Lynch, and nobody saw that coming at all,” DeWit said.
Lynch and former president Bill Clinton had a private meeting on a Tarmac at a Phoenix airport in 2016. Comey said the meeting caused him to doubt the Department of Justice. At the hearing, Comey said Lynch had told him not to call the meeting an investigation, but a matter instead, which confused and concerned Comey.
“In the attorney general instructing the FBI director to call it a matter instead of an investigation, they were telling him to adopt the Clinton campaign talking points,” DeWit said. “That was straight off the Clinton campaign points to always refer to it as a matter and not an investigation.”
Comey confirmed at the hearing that his decision was influenced by the meeting.
“Yes, in an ultimately conclusive way, that was a thing that capped it for me that I had to do something separately to protect the credibility of the investigation, which meant both the FBI and the Justice Department,” Comey said.
DeWit felt Comey did come across as credible as a witness.
“I don’t think many people questioned his credibility that much,” DeWit said. “He seemed to be pretty open and honest with it, especially even when he was possibly indicting himself as a leaker.”
