Blanche
(Photo
by
Valerie
Plesch/Bloomberg
via
Getty
Images)
Todd
Blanche
is
pretending
to
prosecute
James
Comey
for
threatening
the
president
…
but
he’s
not
pretending
very
hard.
Yesterday
the
Acting
Attorney
General
sat
down
for
a
chat
with
Meet
the
Press’s
Kristen
Welker.
Like
his
predecessor,
he
knows
his
main
job
is
going
on
television
—
although
his
schtick
involves
the
wide-eyed
affectation
of
sincerity,
rather
than
indignant
tirades.
He
didn’t
mention
the
Dow
even
once!
Naturally,
Blanche
was
asked
about
the
indictment
of
the
former
FBI
Director
for
posting
a
picture
of
seashells
arranged
to
form
the
number
“8647.”
“How
does
that
image
of
seashells
amount
to
a
serious
threat
against
the
president’s
life?”
wondered
the
host.
Blanche
insisted
that
the
indictment
was
the
culmination
of
a
long,
careful
investigation
by
“career”
law
enforcement.
They’ve
been
combing
that
beach
for
months
looking
for
clues!
“Rest
assured
that
the
career
assistant
United
States
attorneys
in
North
Carolina,
the
career
FBI
agents,
the
career
secret
service
agents
that
investigated
this
case
didn’t
just
look
at
the
Instagram
post
and
walk
away.
That’s
why
you
saw
an
indictment
last
week,
notwithstanding
the
fact
that
it
was
last
May
that
the
post
was
made,”
he
said,
cocking
his
head
like
a
vice
principal
explaining
that
the
dress
code
isn’t
sexist,
it’s
about
respect.
In
fact,
the
only
line
attorney
willing
to
put
his
name
on
this
POS
indictment
was
Matthew
Petracca,
whose
prior
experience
was
mainly
in
state
Medicaid
fraud.
His
signature
will
presumably
save
the
case
from
going
the
way
of
Comey’s
previous
indictment,
which
was
dismissed
because
Lindsey
Halligan
was
never
lawfully
appointed
as
US
Attorney
in
the
Eastern
District
of
Virginia.
Petracca’s
boss
W.
Ellis
Boyle
has
stuck
around
calling
himself
US
Attorney
for
the
Eastern
District
of
North
Carolina,
despite
the
expiration
of
his
120-day
interim
appointment
and
his
failure
to
win
Senate
confirmation.
Pressed
as
to
what
kind
of
evidence
prosecutors
could
have
other
than
the
image,
and
Comey’s
immediate
retraction
and
repudiation
of
violence,
Blanche
practically
tapped
the
side
of
his
nose.
“We
are
talking
about
evidence
of
all
sorts.
And
that
means
documents,
that
means
witnesses
and
that
means,
that
means
the
whole
array
of
what
we
did,”
he
simpered.
This
is
a
gambler
who
knows
he’ll
never
have
to
lay
his
cards
on
the
table.
Sooner
or
later
—
and
probably
sooner
—
the
cops
are
going
to
bust
in
and
confiscate
the
chips.
Just
like
the
last
time
the
DOJ
indicted
Comey,
a
court
will
dismiss
this
dog
of
a
case
long
before
it
gets
to
a
jury.
And
so
Blanche
is
free
to
say
absolutely
anything
without
worry
that
it
will
jeopardize
the
prosecution.
Well,
not
anything.
He’s
not
an
idiot
like
FBI
Director
Kash
Patel,
flapping
his
yap
about
the
presentation
to
the
grand
jury.
Todd
Blanche
does
understand
that
grand
jury
secrecy
under
Rule
6(e)
of
the
Federal
Rules
of
Criminal
Procedure
is
actually
kind
of
mandatory.
But
if
he
ever
thought
this
case
was
going
to
trial,
Blanche
wouldn’t
concede
that
lots
of
people
post
“8647”
online
and
don’t
get
arrested
for
threatening
to
kill
the
president.
“That
phrase
is
used
constantly,”
he
admitted.
“There
are
constantly
men
and
women
who
choose
to
make
threatening
statements
against
President
Trump.
Every
one
of
those
statements
do
not
result
in
indictments,
of
course.”
If
this
were
a
real
case,
the
head
of
the
Justice
Department
wouldn’t
be
on
national
television
explaining
that
no
one
else
in
a
comparable
situation
is
getting
charged.
Blanche
is
an
experienced
criminal
lawyer
—
he
knows
this
clip
will
be
Exhibit
A
in
Comey’s
motion
to
dismiss
for
selective
and
vindictive
prosecution.
At
this
point,
you
have
to
assume
this
whole
thing
is
part
of
a
troll.
It’s
not
clear
whether
Alina
Habba
is
in
on
the
joke,
though.
She
spent
a
few
months
LARP-ing
as
US
Attorney
for
New
Jersey,
but
her
prosecutorial
experience
is
effectively
nil.
It’s
entirely
possible
that
she
didn’t
intentionally
undermine
the
Comey
indictment
on
“The
View”
last
week.
Maybe
she
did
it
out
of
sheer
incompetence.
“A
gentleman
posted
that
about
me.
He
posted
on
Twitter
‘86
Habba’
and
he
was
also
charged,”
she
huffed,
as
the
audience
laughed
at
her
claim
that
the
DOJ
“brings
real
cases.”
In
fact,
Florida
man
Salvatore
Russotto
did
tweet
out
his
wish
to“86”
Habba,
along
with
Senator
Chuck
Schumer,
Rep.
Hakeem
Jeffries,
Joe
Biden,
Jim
Comey,
Justice
Ketanji
Brown
Jackson,
Canada,
“all
demonRATS,”
and
Black
people.
He
wished
“a
slow
and
painful
death”
on
both
Comey
and
Habba,
and
“A
VERY
PAINFUL
DEATH”
for
former
Deputy
FBI
Director
Dan
Bongino.
In
the
event,
he
was
only
indicted
for
threatening
Habba
—
and
it
didn’t
take
11
months
to
investigate.
Blanche’s
argument
is
essentially
“trust
us,
we’re
the
DOJ.”
In
the
same
appearance
where
he
insisted
that
Americans
have
to
show
ID
to
eat
in
a
restaurant,
the
Acting
AG
promised
to
share
the
fruits
of
a
supposedly
meticulous
investigation
which
has
been
underway
for
almost
a
year.
In
reality,
Pam
Bondi
looked
at
this
case
and
tossed
the
rancid
crustacean
carcasses
back
into
the
water.
MSNOW
reports
that
the
case
was
on
indefinite
hold
until
Bondi
got
fired,
at
which
point
Blanche
demanded
that
someone
bring
him
Comey’s
head.
It
takes
serious
chutzpah
to
defend
this
blatant
lawlessness
by
relying
on
the
institutional
credibility
of
the
very
agency
you’re
destroying.
But
once
you
get
used
to
lying
on
national
television
for
a
living,
selling
out
the
profession
is
all
in
a
day’s
work.
Liz
Dye produces
the
Law
and
Chaos Substack and podcast. You
can
subscribe
by
clicking
the
logo:
