Newly appointed White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany criticized the FBI for its handling of the investigation into former national security adviser Michael Flynn.
“The FBI exists to investigate crimes. But in the case of Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, it appears that they might have existed to manufacture one,” McEnany said during a White House press conference on Friday. “As a motion filed by the Department of Justice yesterday explained, the FBI set out to interview Gen. Michael Flynn when they had no predicate for any investigation of any crime.”
“Over the past week, we learned from a handwritten note the true intent behind the FBI’s investigation of Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn,” she added.
[Read more: Trump teases ‘MUCH more to come’ after DOJ drops Flynn case]
.@PressSec rips the FBI for their treatment of Gen. Michael Flynn:
“The FBI exists to investigate crimes. But in the case of Lt. General Michael Flynn, it appears that they might have existed to manufacture one.”pic.twitter.com/QYdTVlQyiq
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) May 8, 2020
The handwritten note was released in late April and showed an FBI official ruminating about an impending FBI interview with Flynn.
“I agreed yesterday that we shouldn’t show Flynn [REDACTED] if he didn’t admit” but “I thought about it last night and I believe we should rethink this,” the FBI official wrote. “What is our goal? Truth/Admission or to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired?”
Another document that was released indicated that fired FBI agent Peter Strzok stopped the bureau from shutting down the investigation into Flynn in early January 2017 despite “no derogatory information” being found.
Flynn pleaded guilty in 2017 to lying to the FBI about his conversations with a Russian diplomat before Trump entered the White House.
Flynn cooperated with special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election but took a more combative approach after replacing his legal team. His new team aggressively fought the charges against Flynn, who declared his innocence in January and claimed he was set up by the FBI.
Following the release of some FBI documents that Flynn’s lawyers argued exonerated their client, the Justice Department announced Thursday afternoon that it was dropping all criminal charges against Flynn. The judge presiding over the case will now decide whether to dismiss it.
