KUALA LUMPUR: Former United States Attorney General Loretta Lynch, who spearheaded the Department of Justice probe into 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB), has come under scrutiny for her role in controversies surrounding a probe into Hillary Clinton’s issues when she was US Secretary of State.
Eleven Republican members of Congress on Wednesday sent a criminal referral to the US Justice Department, seeking an investigation on her, former Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) chief James Comey, his deputy Andrew McCabe, as well as Clinton, said a Fox News report.
Also named were FBI agents Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, plus several other figures.
The criminal referral revolves around what the Republicans termed “dissimilar degrees of zealousness” in the four individuals’ probe into Clinton’s as well as President Donald Trump’s campaigns and their respective advisors.
The call for a criminal referral was made by Florida Republican representative Ron De Santis and 10 others, who submitted a letter to Attorney General Jeff Sessions, FBI Director Christopher Wray, and US Attorney John Huber.
The 11 are seeking an investigation into matters from the handling of probes into Clinton’s leaked emails, anti-Trump dossier funding, as well as the sale of US uranium mining facilities to a Russian company, also known as the ‘Uranium One’ controversy.
In the letter, they wrote: “Because we believe that those in positions of high authority should be treated the same as every other American, we want to be sure that the potential violations of law outlined below are vetted appropriately.”
Sessions last month had already announced that he had assigned a federal prosecutor to review some of those broader issues, and had resisted calls for a second special counsel.
The criminal referral on Lynch cited an alleged threat of “reprisal” against an informant in the Uranium One case, which dealt with the Obama administration allowing the sale of US uranium mining facilities to Russia's state atomic energy company.
Clinton was Secretary of State at the time, and the State Department was one of nine agencies that agreed to approve the deal.
Lynch first entered the Malaysian public consciousness on July 20 last year, when she announced the filing of civil forfeiture complaints seeking the forfeiture and recovery of more than $1 billion (RM3.5 billion) in assets associated with “an international conspiracy to launder funds misappropriated from a Malaysian sovereign wealth fund.”
1MDB, in response, had said it was not a party to the civil suit, and denied claims that it had assets in the US, nor has it benefited from the various transactions described in the civil suit. 1MDB also said it had not been contacted by the US Department of Justice or any other foreign agency in relation to the investigations.
The referral on Comey, meanwhile, centred on a statement he had drafted before interviewing Clinton as part of the email probe. Republicans have claimed that the statement had unfairly cleared her months before the case was over, and contrasted with Comey’s September 2016 congressional testimony in which he said a decision was made not to recommend criminal charges after interviewing Clinton.
As for Clinton, the Republican lawmakers expressed concern that a lawyer representing her 2016 campaign paid the firm behind the research that led to the anti-Trump dossier. The letter argued that they disguised the payments by not properly disclosing them to the US Federal Election Commission.
The referral on McCabe, meanwhile, focused on him leaking information about a probe into the Clinton Foundation to the press, on whether financial crimes or influence-peddling occurred related to the charity.
Meanwhile, the Fox News report said the section on Strzok and Page focused on their “interference in the Hillary Clinton investigation.” The two FBI officials, who worked on Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s team for a short period and were romantically involved, had frequently shared anti-Trump text messages.
Lastly, the lawmakers asked that Sessions investigate personnel connected to the “compilation of documents on alleged links between Russia and then-presidential candidate Donald Trump known as the 'Steele dossier.'" The letter cites those individuals as McCabe, Comey, former Acting Attorney General Sally Yates and FBI General Counsel Dana Boente, among others.
The dossier was presented to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) to obtain a warrant to conduct surveillance on Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.