It is FBI policy to not issue any statement when they decide not to refer charges. It is extremely unusual, almost never, that they violate this policy. But Comey decided to have a press conference in which he explained his rationale not to refer charges and admonished Clinton for, in his opinion, being sloppy. It was not his job to do either. He created a mess.
FBI officials are cops. Comey is the top cop. It is not the top cop’s job to discuss the inner workings of the FBI with the public. It is not the top cop’s job to state public opinions about the cases that they investigate. There are very good reasons for this, and we are seeing the results now.
When Comey gave his press conference he injected himself and the FBI into the political process. By entering the picture, rather than simply referring the decision not to charge up to the Attorney General’s Office, he lay the groundwork for a political crisis. A crisis which began today with Comey’s letter saying that new evidence had come to light. If the matter had resided within the FBI, the investigative department, the investigation could be continued, the new evidence would be added to the totality, and any previous decisions to not to refer charges up could be reevaluated. That’s how the FBI should work.
Instead, Clinton’s emails have become a political football. The public doesn’t understand that adding new evidence to an investigation is just a first step in evaluating the new evidence and determining whether to refer the matter to the Attorney General’s Office. The public is conditioned to react that every new email story is big news. They hear ‘email investigation reopened,’ and the political world goes wild. This is entirely Comey’s responsibility for breaking long standing policy.
It was widely reported that Comey took the almost unprecedented step of holding his press conference because he wanted to protect the integrity of the FBI. That his goal was to get the investigation out of the way so that it would not interfere with the election. What he did was to inject the FBI into the election process. Then when new evidence was discovered, which may not yet even have been examined, he felt forced to go public again, injecting the FBI once more into the election process just eleven days before the election.
Not only did Comey’s break with policy fail to protect the integrity of the FBI, it had the opposite effect. It rendered the FBI open to public scrutiny, politicization, and ridicule. Whatever his intentions, Comey’s break from long standing policy has done lasting damage to the institution of the FBI.