What does a former staffer's immunity deal mean for Hillary Clinton?

[yardwork]

After reading all the breathless headlines here warning of imminent jail time for the likely Democratic nominee, I found today's article in the Washington Post to be interesting. (Bold type below mine.)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/what-does-a-former-staffers-immunity-deal-mean-for-hillary-clinton/2016/03/03/0fbb6ab2-e15e-11e5-846c-10191d1fc4ec_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-more-top-stories_clintonemail-339pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory

The revelation that the Justice Department has granted immunity to a former State Department staff member who worked on Hillary Clinton’s private email server is a likely indication that the investigation is nearing a conclusion, but should not be read as a sign that the leading Democratic presidential candidate is going to face criminal charges, legal experts said.

...

“I don’t know that I would necessarily jump to the conclusion that this person has ‘flipped,’ and now they’re going to say a bunch of incriminating things about other people,” Shur said, adding that the agents could simply be making sure they have spoken to everyone relevant to the investigation.

...

The FBI is looking to wrap up the Clinton inquiry — a criminal investigation of the possible mishandling of classified information — in the coming months, according to a senior U.S. law enforcement official. There are no outward signs that prosecutors have convened a grand jury, a powerful tool that would allow them to subpoena witnesses.

...

Clinton and the State Department have said that none of the material was marked classified at the time it was sent, but Clinton has apologized and called her use of the private email account a “mistake.” Many in the legal community have said it would be difficult to imagine her being charged.

[beachbum bob]

1. Means gop house sub committee can't mess with him

[Jim Lane]

32. Or maybe it means they can call him and compel his testimony at a hearing.

Now he can't resist a Congressional subpoena by pleading the Fifth.

[salinsky]

2. It means Hillary is the presumptive Democratic nominee for POTUS ...

... and the FBI and Justice Dept are anxious to wrap this up and avoid even the appearance of attempting to influence an election, and an immunity deal can only expedite the process.

[yardwork]

11. Looks that way.

[RobertEarl]

45. Anyone of us

and we be in jail already. But they better not mess with Bill's wife!

[Hortensis]

38. My guess exactly.. Dragging this out months into

the primary looks very bad for the investigators. If this continued, the investigation itself could conceivably end up the subject of investigation.

[MADem]

3. Comey said, months ago, that she is not a target. They're just T crossing and i dotting.

Many who have hung their hopes on a Hill Frog March are going to be terribly, terribly disappointed.

If needing a competitor to be indicted is viewed as an acceptable way for a candidate to advance, there's probably something not quite resonating, there.

[yardwork]

4. Snort.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

5. It would be like a Spurs or Cavaliers fan hoping Steph Curry breaks his leg./nt

[MADem]

7. Yep!!! nt

[yardwork]

9. That's not very sportsmanlike, is it?

Fans of a team that positions itself as the ethical choice wouldn't stoop to something like that, would they?

[DemocratSinceBirth]

12. More dignity in defeating your opponent fair and square./nt

[yardwork]

13. I would think that that would be very important to a candidate running on a "good guy" platform.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

14. The whole "good guy" shtick is a chimera.

[yardwork]

15. Say it ain't so!

[DemocratSinceBirth]

16. A certain group has been flogging this e-mail story with more glee than the Republicans.

[yardwork]

17. That's because even the Republicans know that it's a non-story.

[panader0]

20. I disagree. The investigation is serious.

The American voters need to have this out in the open. It may very well amount to nothing except very poor
judgment, a "mistake" as she put it. But I remember when John Edwards was still in the race, and if the truth
about him had emerged after he was elected, it would have been disastrous for the Democratic Party. Let's get
it out in the open as soon as possible and let the people decide.
ETA: I hope the guy avoids small planes.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

21. We are all adults here...

The Sanders people know in their bones he can't beat Clinton strg8 up....

ETA: I hope the guy avoids small planes.

I don' t even know what this means as he poses no threat at all; none, zero, nada, null. He has no plausible path to the nomination.

[panader0]

22. not Sanders--the guy that will be testifying against Hillary.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

23. HRC has the computer skills of someone in her age group, which are usually minimal...

I suspect all the FBI will learn is HRC asked him to set up an e-mail account and server, and that's it...

Also, Team Clinton has urged him to cooperate with the investigation since the summer. If I was a young techie without deep pockets for lawyers I wouldn't talk without immunity either.

[OKNancy]

35. He's not testifying against her, he is testifying for her

His purpose being called was to discuss the security of the server. He says the server was never hacked.

[Press Virginia]

36. For her? Really?

If he's gotten an immunity deal it's to testify against someone.

[Hortensis]

40. No. There are big players here. He was told long ago

to stay out, not because he needs to have done anything wrong but to keep him from turning into collateral damage for those trying to bring her down.

[Press Virginia]

42. Or there's evidence he committed a crime

and was offered a deal.

At this point, we don't know.

[yardwork]

44. We will know soon.

[Hortensis]

47. True, but almost certainly any crime would be hers,

and we know of no evidence of a crime that has turned up. But as said, we will know soon.

We are among well over 200 million citizens eligible to vote. Do you have any conception of what a HUGE miscarriage of democracy, of OUR rights, indicting one of our candidates for president at THIS point instead of last summer or before would be? The one, in fact, most likely to be elected president? That is why we are really as sure as we can be that all they are doing is trying to complete the investigation, for HER sake as well as the nation's, and close it.

[Press Virginia]

48. No evidence other than at least 4 Emails containing TS/SCI information

and weren't retroactively classifiied but were such at the time they were created.
Then there's the SAP information which, somehow, jumped out of the SD's classified system into HRC's server.
And that's just the stuff we actually know about.

If she's indicted it'll be because of her own actions and decisions nothing else. At the very least classified information was retained, by her, in an unsecure and unauthorized location....which was one of the charges against Petreaus.

And complaining about the timing, when the delay was originally caused by her decision to PDF all the e-mails rather than having them turned over electronically is laughable.

If she committed a crime, indict her....I don't care when.

[Hortensis]

61. You sound emotionally invested in taking Hillary

Clinton down. If you are a typical person doing this you know virtually to literally nothing about what your own congressman has been doing, but you can rattle Breitbart propaganda off about her at will while wilfully forgetting the context all this takes place in to allow you to believe it. That's called selective memory. So, be an enemy.

[Press Virginia]

65. If I were the one with the emotional investment

I'd whine about the injustice of having HRC facing the possibility of an indictment while running for POTUS. I might even go so far as to make personal attacks on anyone who could cite facts, like statements from the OIC or State Department admissions, because I couldn't think rationally.

Heck, I might even blame Breitbart while ignoring the NY Times, WaPo, Huffpo and Salon have written similar stories with the same facts.

[Hortensis]

66. Selective versions of facts to support what

you want to believe. I read all these also and have a subscription to the NY Times. By your own statement you will have read statements from many sources and experts, including spokesmen for the Justice and State Departments, repeated in various reports that should have killed hopes of an indictment dead, but somehow they did not.

I went and looked to see if I was making wrong assumptions about your attitude, but nope. I read a couple at the top of a whole page of you on Hillary that googling pulled up. 'Nixonian" of her, huh? Well, keep waiting, Press. Obviously nothing's going to stop you.

With any luck, you'll get to have 8 years of a Hillary presidency to wait for indictments finally to be issued.

[Press Virginia]

67. I actually have had a TS/SCI(now lapsed)

I'm well, weeellll, aware of the responsibilities that come with having one.

She retained classified information after leaving her position, which is a felony.
She retained that information in a non secure location, another felony.

You can talk about what you think of me all you like, it keeps you from having to think about the possibility of an indictment.

[Hortensis]

68. My husband also. He worked on some of the

DC computer systems a few times, including at the State Department well before Hillary got there. He's not partisan toward anyone but reads the entire thing as a smear on Hillary. Just another phony -gate she's surviving just fine.

Hillary's share of the popular vote so far is far higher than Bernie's, btw. Just further evidence that people want justice in this world. Remember when it was Bill who was under attack? Attempted impeachment LOST its proponents 5 House seats. It probably hasn't occurred to you, but you just may be helping elect Hillary Clinton president...

[Press Virginia]

69. Hahahaha! If what you say is true

he'd have told you how ridiculous HRCs "marked classified" excuse is because he would have signed off on State's NDA

[Hortensis]

70. And yet he didn't. Maybe the Clintons got to him

and he's keeping it from me for my own protection. Come to think of it, he didn't want me to fly to Arkansas this winter...

I'm done with this. It's boring and to no point.

[Press Virginia]

71. He's keeping you from finding out about

a disclosure statement that can be found by googling?

[yardwork]

25. The investigation has been taken very seriously.

There have been a lot of resources put into this investigation. Nobody can say that the Obama administration hasn't taken this very seriously - in start contrast with the way that Republican administrations handle far, far worse issues.

The investigation is out in the open and continues.

The comment about the guy avoiding small planes is really in poor taste, and below the belt.

[840high]

58. .^that

[NashuaDW]

6. The main thing it means...

Is that he will be forced to testify. No more pleading the 5th

[yardwork]

8. The Clinton team says that they are happy about that. They want him to testify.

At least, that's what they're quoted as saying in the article. I didn't post that paragraph but it's at the link.

[MADem]

10. What it means is that he doesn't have to worry about being charged for any little thing he did wrong

or any shortcuts he might have taken.

It's not being "forced," he's willingly speaking, without fear of charges against him.

[yardwork]

18. Kick

[Lucinda]

19. KNR

[yardwork]

31. Thank you!

[ConsiderThis_2016]

24. Liars can relate to Liars... it's what they do that counts

[ismnotwasm]

26. K&R

Sick of the damn emails...

[yardwork]

27. Thank you!

[Bucky]

28. If it's a politicized investigation a la Ken Starr, it means the prosecutor's desperate

I truly hope she's not charged. If she is, I hope it all comes out before the end of March.

[yardwork]

30. Legal experts quoted in the article state that it is very unlikely she will be charged with anything

They say that this is a sign that the investigation is winding down and Clinton won't be charged.

[TeddyR]

33. No, that is incorrect.

There is no quote from any legal expert in that article saying that. The only quote saying she might not be charged is from a person stating she "probably could be charged" but might not be because "politics may prevent them from doing so." That isn't exactly a ringing "not guilty" endorsement.

[Press Virginia]

37. If it goes to a grand jury she'll be charged.

It's odd timing that the immunity deal was announced within days of Lynch refusing to confirm or deny a grand jury has been empaneled to hear evidence

[yardwork]

41. I think that you are reading a different article.

The quote I reference is boldfaced in the paragraph I cite in my OP.

Where is the statement that you claim is in this article?

[TeddyR]

50. 4th paragraph from the bottom

Of the article that is linked in your post. States that "prosecutors probably could charge" Hillary, etc.

[Thinkingabout]

29. K & R, thanks for posting, soon the crying will be over.

[sheshe2]

34. One more 'trumped'

up CT about to be put to rest... for awhile.

K&R

[H2O Man]

39. Recommended.

I'm responding, before looking through previous comments.

I do not think there's any real chance of Hillary Clinton being blamed for anything here. However, it is possible that someone else could be. And that's not a good thing.

[yardwork]

43. Thanks. None of this has been a good thing.

Hillary should not have set up a separate email server. It's plausible to me that she did so because the State Dept's server was notoriously difficult to use, but what she did was a bad idea.

I don't think that it rises to the level of being criminal and I think that the Republicans have made much too much of it.

Anyway, it looks like the thorough investigation is coming to an end.

[azurnoir]

46. 2nd time today for this so it must mean -nothing to see here 'cause the DoJ gives immunity for that

she doesn't have to be charged with anything-just the investigation itself is enough to have a negative impact on her candidacy

[stevenleser]

49. This is excellent news really. The investigation will be complete and thorough

And when it is finished, and the results are made public, no one will be able to accuse Hillary of anything. At least not where anyone other than far right wingnuts who wouldn't vote for a Democrat anyway would believe it or be concerned.

[Hortensis]

62. Right.

[William769]

51. Kick & very highly recommended!

[yardwork]

53. Thank you!

[Cha]

52. Thank you, yardwork!

[yardwork]

54. Thanks so much!

[Cha]

55. KICK!

[Gothmog]

56. Great article in OP

This investigation is not going anywhere

[Iliyah]

57. K & R

The extent the GOP and far left will go.

[MaggieD]

59. Kick

[bravenak]

60. Kick!!

[yardwork]

63. Thank you!

[oasis]

64. Kick and recommend