Prosecutors subpoena a Comey adviser in a revived leak investigation
Federal prosecutors issued a grand jury subpoena requiring Daniel Richman, a longtime friend and adviser to former FBI director James Comey, to testify in a renewed investigation into whether Comey improperly shared sensitive information with the media, according to a source familiar with the investigation.
What happened
The subpoena indicates that prosecutors have returned to longstanding allegations that Comey used Richman to leak memos he had written about sensitive investigations or meetings with President Trump to reporters, and suggests that prosecutors are once again considering bringing a criminal case in the matter. If they did so against Comey, it would mark the department's third attempt to prosecute one of Trump's most prominent political foes; Comey is already facing charges over a social media post depicting sea shells that spelled out 8647. Special Counsel John Durham previously examined the same conduct and, while he criticized some of the decisions made by Comey and other top government officials, did not find evidence to support criminal prosecutions against them. CNN reported the subpoena on the account of a source familiar with the investigation and records that Fox News reported it first; no source states the date the subpoena was issued.
Why it matters
The mechanism this documents is repetition: the same allegations a special counsel already examined without finding a basis to charge are being put before a grand jury again, which makes the number of attempts, rather than the strength of any one of them, the operative pressure on a named adversary of the president. A prosecution that can be revived indefinitely imposes cost regardless of whether it ever reaches a charge, and it is that reusability, not this subpoena on its own, that belongs on this record.