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A pain in the neck, the “sniper.” These are some of the nicknames given to the now former F.B.I. director, James Comey.
He faced two administrations: George W. Bush and Barck Obama's, before being fired by President Donald Trump.
Comey, who is 6.6 feet tall, is not only used to stand out and be the center of attention, but also to cause controversy and resist attacks. Until now, he had always remained untouched. But the investigation regarding the alleged Russian interference in the Presidential election dug his grave.
Born on December 14, 1960 in Yonkers, New York, the lawyer graduated from Chicago University became famous when he was appointed Attorney General in the Richmond Division of the Eastern District of Virginia (1996-2001), where he developed “Project Exile,” a program to tighten measures against criminals and which is related to the decrease in murder rates in the state.
Comey, who was also Attorney General in New York's metropolitan region, was appointed Deputy Attorney General under George W. Bush's administration. He served from 2003 to 2005, when he witnessed Bush's reinforcement on espionage tactics under the code Stellar Wind, which permitted the Federal Bureau of Investigation (F.B.I.) and the National Security Agency (N.S.A.) to spy thousands of phone calls, as well as emails.
Comey, who asserted that these type of practices violated the Constitution, advised to the then Attorney, John Ashcroft, not to authorize again Stellar Wind. When Ashcroft fell sick, Comey was temporarily in charge of the Department of Justice and procured Ashcroft's negative to restart the program. W. Bush enraged and signed himself the re-authorization as Commander in Chief.
For a time, Comey vanished from the political scene, until a Democrat president, Barack Obama, rescued him and appointed him, in 2013, as F.B.I. director. Thus, controversy returned to his life. First, when he called forth serious discussion about racial issues after the murder of young African-American Michael Brown, in 2011. However, his defining moment and the most scandalous one was his investigation on Hillary Clinton, regarding her usage of a private server to send official emails.
The real storm came in October, a few days before the Presidential election, when Comey announced his decision to retake the mailing case. It was a “beautiful” decision, assured Trump at that moment, and he did not hesitate to express his “respect” to the fact that Comey “came back as he did.”
The day of the elections came and Clinton was defeated, something that he has not doubted to attribute in great measure to Comey's actions, Clinton's prosecutor and biggest pain in the neck.
Honoring his “sniper” nickname, Comey decided to “shoot” again and confirmed that, along with his inquiry about Russia's interference in the American electoral process, the F.B.I. was investigating the alleged links between Trump's people and Russia. Not satisfied with that, he also refused that there was any evidence on the Obama administration spying on Trump's communications when he was a candidate.
The media believes that since then, the President began to plot Comey's dismissal, which finally took place last Tuesday.
For now, Comey's firing seems to be the natural outcome of a political career which has always been someone else's pain in the neck.
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