Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche defended the indictment of former FBI Director James Comey as he was questioned about calls for political violence.
CBS’s chief Washington correspondent, Major Garrett, interviewed Blanche on “CBS Mornings” following the charges against Comey over his “86 47” seashell post on social media last year. Garrett brought up conservative pundit Jack Posobiec, who had posted “8646” during the Biden administration.
“Let’s do a compare and contrast, Mr. Blanche,” Garrett said. “In 2022, someone well known in right-wing circles, Jack Posobiec, posted on X, ‘8646.’ He did not take it down. Mr. Comey has done both of those things. The Biden Justice Department never prosecuted him. By the standard of that grand jury, Jack Posobiec should face charges as well. Will the Justice Department pursue that case, because they sound very similar?”
(Video: CBS Mornings/YouTube)
Blanche fired back with a lesson on how a grand jury works as he reminded that threatening the life of the president is a federal crime.
“That’s just completely not true,” he told Garrett.
“That’s not how a grand jury does its work. They don’t just look at a single image and then say, ‘OK, yes, we’ll indict,’ or ‘OK, no, we won’t indict.’ They do an investigation. This conduct took place in May of last year, May 15. It has been almost a year,” he continued, referring to Comey’s photo of seashells on a beach spelling out “8647.”
“I assure you, the FBI, the Secret Service, and the U.S. Attorney’s office have not been sitting around doing nothing. They have been investigating. I have no idea whether there was an investigation into the other times that that post has been made and whether that investigation yielded different results,” Blanche said.
“This investigation that we undertook resulted in a two-count indictment. So you cannot compare, ‘Well, what happened last time?’ What happened this time? Every investigation is different. You know that. The American people know that,” the acting AG noted.
“A lot of factors go into whether someone should or should not be charged. The mere fact there’s a similar photo posted or similar statement made. That’s true every day, there’s comments made about President Trump, threats made against President Trump,” he said. “Every one of those are not indicted. It depends on the facts of every case.”
Blanche pushed back at Garrett again when he asked him whether the case against Comey was a “serious” one.
“If anybody in this country thinks — especially given what happened over the past couple of years with respect to President Trump — that it is okay for anybody to threaten the president of the United States … and then have the media or others say, well that’s not serious, then we have a bigger problem than I even imagined in this country,” Blanche said.
“You cannot threaten the President of the United States. That’s not my decision, that’s Congress’s decision, in a law that they passed,” he added, “and so, yes, of course, this is a serious case.”
