classified information, there is evidence that they were extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information. now, according to this i.g. report, comey s decision to make that announcement without consulting then attorney general loretta lynch was, quote, extraordinary and insubordinate. it also says comey, quote, made a serious error of judgment when he sent a letter to congress reopening the investigation of clinton s e-mails just days before the presidential election. but despite those findings, it also noted, quote, we found no evidence that comey s public statement announcing the fbi s decision to close the investigation was a result of bias or an effort to influence the election. the report also reveals new text messages from two of the fbi agents involved in the investigation. you perhaps have heard their story before. lisa page, peter strzok, who have been targets of trump and his supporters as they have sought to discredit federal law
what items he ll be asserting a privilege in. the privilege would mean that prosecutors working on the case in southern district of new york wouldn t be able to take a look at those items. we ll have to see how that hearing goes. there have been rumors all week that there may be an indictment coming in the not too distant future for mr. cohen. so that could be a very serious development when it takes place. and then on this same time line, it s just incredible how much activity is going on all at once here, all surrounding a sitting president of the united states. we ve got the attorney general in the state of new york who has filed a civil action aimed at the trump foundation. but much of the information contained in this civil complaint also has criminal implications, and the attorney general has referred the case to the irs, federal tax, and also to the federal election commission for criminal referrals. there s a lot of activity, none
that this was a good thing for the fbi, enabling them to try and move past this. but at the end of the day, until, you know, the country feels better about the 2016 election, the fbi will continue to be a target of criticism. and i don t think that the country has come to terms with the election yet. jill, how big were the ripples in the trump pond today about this new york state attorney general lawsuit who, depending on who you talk to today, people thought this could be a kind of sneaky big deal? yeah, i mean it was very much overshadowed by all the anticipation over the i.g. report that folks kind of didn t have a chance i think to catch their breaths and really process what this investigation of this lawsuit found. of course this isn t the first time that the new york attorney general s office has investigated the president. it was originally for his trump university, that program that he ran that was the a.g. accused him basically of being a scam. but these are really inter
and i think that you saw that today on both sides of this. but i think with donald trump, what is the turf that he is most comfortable fighting on is when he is telling people, look, there is a systematic effort to undo me, to undo this presidency by people who felt that i was illegitimately elected. and this report has a lot of evidence that there were people who certainly were biased against him. and as one person told me today, when we are in a situation when people think that the system is out to disenfranchise them, that is a horrible place to be in as a country. now, of course, that s not what this report said. this report said that despite the bias that was clearly expressed by these two fbi agents, there was no evidence that that bias led them to use the levers of government, to use the power of the fbi to change the outcome of the election.
it also says comey, quote, made a serious error of judgment when he sent a letter to congress reopening the investigation of clinton s e-mails just days before the presidential election. but despite those findings, it also noted, quote, we found no evidence that comey s public statement announcing the fbi s decision to close the investigation was a result of bias or an effort to influence the election. the report also reveals new text messages from two of the fbi agents involved in the investigation. you perhaps have heard their story before. lisa page, peter strzok, who have been targets of trump and his supporters as they have sought to discredit federal law enforcement. one exchange between these two shows, quote, page asked strzok, trump s never, ever going to become president, right? right? today s report reveals, quote, strzok replied, no, no, he won t. we ll stop it. the report notes that message casts a cloud over the fbi but also stresses this.