Former Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey leaves the Rayburn House Office Building after testifying on Capitol Hill Dec. 7, 2018, in Washington, D.C.
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The Justice Department has secured a two-count indictment against former FBI Director James Comey for threatening President Trump by posting a photo on social media.
This is the second time the Trump DOJ has gotten an indictment against Comey, a fierce critic and outspoken opponent of President Trump.
A grand jury handed up an indictment against Comey over a photo he posted online last year of seashells on a North Carolina beach arranged to say “8647” — 86 being old slang to mean “get rid of,” and 47 seen by some as a reference to Trump, who is the 47th (and 45th) president.
Comey “did knowingly and willfully make a threat to take the life of, and to inflict bodily harm upon, the President of the United States, in that he publicly posted a photograph on the internet social media site Instagram which depicted seashells arranged in a pattern making out “86 47″, which a reasonable recipient who is familiar with the circumstances would interpret as a serious expression of an intent to do harm to the President of the United States,” according to the indictment, which was unsealed on Tuesday and filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina.
The grand jury also issued a warrant for Comey’s arrest, according to documents in the case.
Both of these counts carry a maximum prison sentence of 10 years, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said at a press conference on Tuesday.
“Threatening the life of the president of the United States will never be tolerated by the Department of Justice,” Blanche said. He mentioned the DOJ has also prosecuted several other cases against people threatening Trump.
“While this case is unique and this indictment stands out because of the name of the defendant, his alleged conduct is the same kind of conduct that we will never tolerate and that we will always investigate and regularly prosecute,” Blanche said.
Questions about bounds of free speech
The post last May prompted an uproar among some Republicans, with Donald Trump Jr. accusing Comey of “calling for my dad to be murdered.” Administration officials last May said they would investigate.
Comey has said he didn’t realize some people associate the numbers with violence and took the post down; he said at the time that he assumed the shells were a “political message,” not a violent one. It’s unclear who created the shell formation.
“I’m still innocent, I’m still not afraid, and I still believe in the independent federal judiciary, so let’s go,” Comey said in an Substack video in response to Tuesday’s indictment.
Several legal experts have also said Comey’s photo seemed to fall in the bounds of political speech protected by the First Amendment.
Blanche pushed back against such criticism on Tuesday. “I don’t know what critics say that, especially today, but it’s not a very difficult line to look at,” he said in response to a reporter’s question on Tuesday.
“You are not allowed to threaten the President of the United States of America. That’s not my decision. That’s Congress’s decision, and a statute that they passed that we charge multiple times a year.”
A statement from Comey’s lawyer said Comey “vigorously denies” the charges in the indictment.
“We will contest these charges in the courtroom and look forward to vindicating Mr. Comey and the First Amendment,” according to the statement shared with NPR.
Past indictments
This indictment is seen as the latest move by the Justice Department to use its vast powers to go after Trump’s perceived political enemies.
Comey has been an outspoken critic of Trump since he led the FBI during the president’s first term. Trump fired Comey in 2017, four years into his ten-year term, as he was overseeing an investigation into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 election.
A federal judge in November dismissed an earlier DOJ attempt to indict James Comey as well as New York Attorney General Letitia James. The Justice Department charged Comey with making false statements and obstructing justice in connection with his testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2020. Prosecutors say Comey lied to the Senate committee when he denied having authorized media leaks; Comey denied the charges.
U.S. District Judge Cameron McGowan Currie found that the acting U.S. attorney who secured the indictments, Lindsey Halligan, was unlawfully appointed. The cases were dismissed without prejudice, meaning the Justice Department had the ability to bring them again.
