Special counsel John Durham’s final report on the origins of the Russian collusion investigation found even more misconduct within the ranks of the FBI than did previous investigations that embarrassed the bureau.
But many of the people cited as having engaged in unethical, and even illegal, behavior remain in positions of power and influence throughout Washington, D.C.
It’s a dynamic that has long fueled frustration with how Democrats and corporate media have treated evidence that the FBI pursued President Donald Trump in 2016 with undue aggression. Some of the officials who oversaw the opening of the Russia investigation were seemingly rewarded with fame and business opportunities.
Durham’s report, however, raises even more questions about the credibility of decision-makers in the collusion investigation.
Describing numerous episodes that took place during the earliest months of the investigation, Durham notes that rank-and-file FBI agents often had questions or doubts about the steps ordered by FBI leadership; those agents were repeatedly overruled.
In one notable instance in spring 2017, Deputy Assistant Director for Counterintelligence Dina Corsi told FBI analysts not to put in writing any of their findings about how little evidence they’d found to support the allegations of Russian collusion. An FBI analyst present for that meeting called the request “highly unusual,” according to Durham, and an attorney who heard Corsi give that directive recalled feeling “shocked” that the agents had been told to relay their findings “orally” without a paper trail.
Corsi appears to be still employed by the FBI, according to her LinkedIn profile, on which she had been active as recently as Wednesday. She lists her title as a deputy assistant director in the FBI’s intelligence branch, working on the Strategic Intelligence Issues Group.
The FBI did not respond to a request for comment.
Other FBI officials who were fired or stepped down in the aftermath of the collusion investigation have faced relatively few professional consequences.
Andrew McCabe, the former deputy director of the FBI, ordered the Russian collusion investigation opened and was accused by the Department of Justice inspector general of lying to investigators about leaks to the media.
Durham found that Peter Strzok, an FBI agent later fired for explicit anti-Trump bias, opened the Russia investigation “at the direction” of McCabe on the basis of “unevaluated intelligence.”
McCabe also ordered FBI field offices to close their investigations of the Clinton Foundation in 2016, Durham found, and was “annoyed” and “angry” when other FBI agents objected to his order.
Trump fired McCabe in 2018 over the inspector general’s findings. McCabe is now a CNN personality, regularly appearing on air to give legal analysis, including, this week, of the report that found fault with his own behavior.
Strzok was fired after text messages between him and another bureau employee, who was also fired, showed he held a deep animosity toward Trump and a desire to prevent Trump from becoming president.
Strzok went on to become a professor at Georgetown University and a bestselling author after landing a book deal.
Michael Sussmann, the Clinton campaign lawyer who gave false information about Trump to the FBI and then lied about his ties to the campaign, was indicted on a charge of making false statements to the FBI.
Durham said Sussmann lied to top FBI officials in 2016 when he approached them with allegations about Trump’s ties to Russia, professing to be uninvolved with any third party despite being on the opposing campaign’s payroll.
He was acquitted by a jury when Durham brought the case to trial and is now a partner at a major law firm, Fenwick & West, still practicing law, according to the firm’s website.
Kevin Clinesmith faced perhaps the most serious allegations of any raised by the DOJ inspector general or Durham: falsifying a document in pursuit of a surveillance warrant on a Trump adviser.
Clinesmith pleaded guilty to altering an email while applying for the surveillance warrant, stripping out language that would have shown a judge that the Trump adviser had in fact been helping the CIA gain information about Russia rather than engaging in suspicious activity with Russia.
But a judge said Clinesmith had suffered enough by facing public scrutiny over his actions and losing his FBI job and sentenced him to just one year of probation, sparing him the jail time Durham requested.
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Clinesmith also got to hold on to his law license, receiving only a temporary suspension of his law license in Washington, D.C., and Michigan, where he is from.
By December 2021, he was restored to the status of a lawyer in “good standing” by the District of Columbia Bar Association.