First on the campaign and now during his first 100 days, an unconventional president has repeatedly set conventional political wisdom on its head. As a result, the predictions of prognosticators have about as much credibility as horoscopes. There just aren’t safe bets anymore.
Well, except one. Real soon Democrats will regret all those mean things they said about FBI Director James Comey. Now that a Republican is in the White House, the top law enforcement official is leaning into the cliché that he’s the last straight arrow in a crooked town.
In a bold public move, Comey asked the Justice Department to rebut allegations that President Trump’s phones were tapped. The request comes after Trump accused his predecessor of eavesdropping on him during the campaign and insinuating that the FBI broke the law.
Trump hasn’t produced any proof so far and now Comey has called his bluff. After cursing the FBI director for restarting an investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private email server less than two weeks before the presidential election, the Left don’t know whether to stay silent or start cheering. The level of their scorn makes reversing their opinion difficult.
Because he reopened the case when additional emails were discovered, Paul Krugman of the New York Times wrote that “the election was rigged by James Comey.” That offense was so great that Jennifer Rubin of the Washington Post called on President Obama to “fire Comey.” And over at Vanity Fair, Kurt Eichenwald took it a step farther demanding that Comey “be barred from any form of public service.” It was brutal, vindictive and seems altogether reactionary now.
The man Democrats once blamed for politicizing the FBI is now going toe-to-toe with a Republican president. But there’s no reason to be surprised. Had the Left really been paying attention, they’d know that Comey doesn’t play politics with open investigations. Former President Bush knows this better than most.
As the deputy attorney general, it was Comey who hired the special investigator who almost sent Scooter Libby, Vice President Cheney’s deputy chief of staff, to federal prison for 30 months. And it was Comey who threatened to resign if the White House didn’t subject its warrantless wiretapping program to oversight by Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Courts.
Regardless of whether one agrees with the conclusions of his investigations into Republican and Democrat politicians, few can doubt that Comey is dedicated to his job. Right now he’s the last lawman standing up to Trump and suddenly an unlikely champion of the opposition party.
Philip Wegmann is a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner.
