‘Defendants responded to plaintiff’s two decades of unblemished and non-partisan public service with a politically motivated and retaliatory demotion…’
(Ben Sellers, Liberty Headlines) Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe—one of the chief architects of the discredited Russia collusion investigation—has filed suit saying he was unfairly fired last year.
McCabe oversaw FBI efforts to spy on the campaign of President Donald Trump and throw the election for his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton. He was ultimately dismissed in March 2018 for inappropriately leaking classified information to the media.
McCabe sued the Justice Department and Attorney General William Barr, claiming his termination last year—for failing to disclose conversations with a reporter about pending investigations—was illegal, reported Bloomberg News.
Also named in the suit were the FBI and its director, Christopher Wray.
A day prior, former FBI counterintelligence head Peter Strzok filed a separate lawsuit for the same reasons, although he and McCabe are not represented by the same law firms, Bloomberg reported.
Both men are believed to be prime subjects in two ongoing investigations being led by the Justice Department—one by Inspector General Michael Horowitz and another by special prosecutor John Durham.
Former FBI Director James Comey is also believed to be facing severe scrutiny from the probes for his role in the alleged partisan collusion.
Jeff Sessions, Barr’s predecessor as attorney general, fired McCabe on the eve of his retirement at the behest of President Donald Trump, who issued multiple tweets criticizing McCabe—who became acting director after Comey’s firing 10 months prior.
Trump celebrated McCabe’s firing—and the denial of his retirement pension—in a March 17 tweet.
Andrew McCabe FIRED, a great day for the hard working men and women of the FBI – A great day for Democracy. Sanctimonious James Comey was his boss and made McCabe look like a choirboy. He knew all about the lies and corruption going on at the highest levels of the FBI!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 17, 2018
However, in his complaint filed Thursday, McCabe asked a federal judge to declare that he retired as an agent in good standing, making him eligible for his pension and benefits.
McCabe highlighted his 21 years of service in the 48-page filing.
That service was undercut by the decision—which some, including Trump, have called a seditious coup—to initiate a probe of Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign—including the now debunked allegations that he coordinated with the Kremlin.
Much of that information was revealed to have come directly from the Hillary Clinton campaign and its contractor Fusion GPS, who used the husband–wife duo of Bruce and Nellie Ohr to funnel the contents of the now-debunked Steele Dossier directly into McCabe’s hands.
Despite being aware of the concerns surrounding the source, British spy Christopher Steele, and his ties to the Kremlin, McCabe and others nonetheless used the phony allegations as the basis for FISA warrant applications to spy on members of the Trump campaign.
Further complicating matters was the fact that, in her bid for the Virginia state Senate, McCabe’s wife, Jill, had accepted nearly half a million dollars in contributions from Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe—a former Clinton campaign bundler and business partner of Hillary Clinton’s brother—even as Andrew McCabe was supposed to be overseeing an investigation into Clinton.
In claiming he was entitled to his pension and benefits, McCabe (who subsequently published a book attacking Trump) continued to deny any wrongdoing on his part.
“Defendants responded to plaintiff’s two decades of unblemished and non-partisan public service with a politically motivated and retaliatory demotion in January 2018 and public firing in March 2018—on the very night of plaintiff’s long-planned retirement from the FBI,” said the court filing.
Justice Department spokeswoman Kerri Kupec declined to comment to Bloomberg on the case.