James Comey admits ‘real sloppiness’ in FBI Russia warrant

James Comey has acknowledged ‘real sloppiness’ over the FBI’s handling of a warrant to surveil a Trump campaign adviser.

Former FBI director James Comey. Picture: AFP

Former FBI director James Comey has acknowledged “real sloppiness” over the bureau’s handling of a warrant to surveil a Trump campaign adviser with ties to Russia.

The adviser, Carter Page, was an early focus of the national security probe the FBI opened into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential campaign.

Mr Comey has long defended the FBI against attacks by President Donald Trump, but he admitted in an interview with Fox News Sunday that Mr Page had been treated unfairly and the FBI application to surveil him, which Mr Comey signed, contained “significant mistakes”.

“There was real sloppiness,
17 things that should’ve been in the applications or at least discussed and characterised differently. It was not acceptable,” said Mr Comey, who Mr Trump fired in 2017.

FBI inspector-general Michael Horowitz detailed the errors in a report last week that found no political bias in the bureau’s handling of the investigation.

“The inspector-general did not find misconduct by FBI personnel, did not find political bias, did not find illegal conduct,” Mr Comey said.

“The inspector-general found significant mistakes, and that is not something to sneeze at; that’s really important.

“But the American people … need to realise they were given false information about the FBI” by Mr Trump and other critics of the bureau, he said.

Mr Trump quickly turned to Twitter: “So now Comey’s admitting he was wrong. Wow, but he’s only doing so because he got caught red-handed.”

Mr Horowitz zeroed in on inaccuracies and omissions in the FBI’s submission to the special FISA court that handles surveillance requests, under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

Among his criticisms was the FBI’s reliance on an unverified dossier by former British intelligence agent Christopher Steele that drew attention to Russian efforts to infiltrate the Trump campaign.

He found the court had not been informed the dossier was paid for by Democrats.

He also found that the FBI failed to inform the court that Mr Page had reported to the CIA on his contacts with the Russians, and that subsequently an FBI lawyer allegedly altered an email to say Mr Page was not a CIA source.

AFP