The False Claims Todd Blanche, Robert McBride, and Some Lady Impersonating a US Attorney Tell to Justify a Crime
DOJ — in the persons of Todd Blanche, some lady impersonating a US Attorney, and First AUSA Robert McBride — have responded to Dan Richman’s demand that they stop illegally rifling through his data.
It’s a remarkable filing for two reasons.
First, they cite a bunch of precedents claiming that one cannot use Rule 41 to thwart a prosecution. Best as I can tell, every single one of those precedents pertain to someone trying to withhold his own property to thwart his own prosecution. Michael Deaver trying to stop a Special Prosecutor investigation of himself. Paul Manafort trying to thwart a prosecution of himself. Justin Paul Gladding in a case where he was trying to get his own non-CSAM data back after a conviction. A grand jury case where the subject of the investigation tried to get his files back.
None of these apply here.
Effectively, Todd Blanche is saying Dan Richman has to lay back and enjoy digital compromise to allow the FBI to prosecute his friend and who cares if they’re breaking the law to do so.
But I’m also struck by the lies Blanche and the lady impersonating a US Attorney tell along the way. Consider this passage.
Richman served as a special government employee at the FBI between June 2015 and February 2017.1 Shortly after his departure from the FBI, the Government began investigating whether Richman had disclosed classified information to The New York Times concerning Comey’s decisionmaking process concerning the FBI’s investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server. See CM/ECF No. 1-1 at 3. The investigation demonstrated, among other things, that Comey had used Richman to provide information to the media concerning his—that is, Comey’s—decisionmaking process concerning the Clinton email investigation and that Richman had served as an anonymous source in doing so.
During the course of the investigation, the Government sought and obtained four search warrants in this district authorizing the Government to search for and seize evidence of violations of 18 U.S.C. §§ 641 and 793 from certain email accounts utilized by Richman, a hard drive containing a forensic image of his personal computer, and his iCloud account.2 See CM/ECF No. 1-1 at 3.
Comey provided relevant testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee shortly before his employment as FBI Director was terminated, and again in September 2020. In May 2017, he testified in response to questioning from Senator Grassley that he had never authorized someone at the FBI to serve as an anonymous source regarding the Clinton email investigation. And in September 2020, he reaffirmed that testimony in response to questioning from Senator Cruz.
1 The government has provided the concise factual summary herein out of an abundance of caution as a result of the Court’s December 6, 2025 temporary restraining order (the “TRO”). See CM/ECF No. 9 at 4. Should the Court have meant the TRO to permit the government to use materials obtained via the relevant search warrants as part of this litigation, the government is prepared to provide a more detailed factual summary if necessary.
2 The investigators sought to obtain evidence of violations of 18 U.S.C. § 641 because it appeared that Richman and Comey were using private email accounts to correspond regarding official government business, i.e., that their correspondence were “record[s]” of the United States. See id.
First, the passage makes a confession, one that Lindsey the Insurance Lawyer Impersonating a US Attorney’s Loaner AUSAs never made: the use of May 2017 files involving attorney-client privilege had no basis in the prosecution, because they long post-dated the time Dan Richman left the FBI.
The filing misstates the genesis of Arctic Haze and the focus on Dan Richman. The investigation didn’t start by focusing on Richman. The focus on Richman appears to have started when John Durham discovered his communications while rifling through the image he shared with the Inspector General (a detail that seems quite sensitive, given the redactions).
The claim that the investigation demonstrated that Comey used Richman,
to provide information to the media concerning his—that is, Comey’s—decisionmaking process concerning the Clinton email investigation and that Richman had served as an anonymous source in doing so.
Is not backed by anything in the public record. Richman was not anonymous when doing this in fall 2016, and there’s no evidence that Comey asked Richman to do this in February 2017, where he was also an on-the-record source.
This filing obscures the fact that when Comey told Chuck Grassley he had not leaked anything anonymously, it preceded the time when Richman did share his memos anonymously, and he disclosed that publicly a month later, meaning it could not conceivably have been a lie on May 3, 2017 (before he shared the memo) or after June 8, 2017, in September 2020, because he had already disclosed it.
McBride claims he’s not using the unlawfully accessed materials in this filing, but he did disclose something new: that Richman and Comey were investigated under 18 USC 641 not because Comey shared a memo that the Inspector General would later rule was official FBI materia, but because they were conducting official business on personal accounts (which is rich given that Lindsey the Insurance Lawyer masquerading as US Attorney used Signal for official business).
The lies are important for a reason beyond the cynicism: They obscure that if the FBI tried to get a warrant for these very same files, they would never be able to access the files they want.
And so they’re telling Dan Richman to just lay back and enjoy the Fourth Amendment violations.
Comey’s and Richman’s legal teams will rip this apart in their responses. However, it continues a pattern where the damage has been done by the allegation. The ones perpetrating this from Bondi to the lawyers signing these filings need to be held accountable, preferably by losing their law licenses and/or remedial training like Kobach got (which TBF had no detectable effect on his subsequent conduct) to leave markers for the next Bar complaint.
FWIW, I don’t see any non-Trumper judge buying this legalistic dreck.
It will be an uphill battle to sue for damages against the government because incompetence is not actionable, only criminal conduct is, and that proof will have to wait until after these cases conclude with all cards on the table.
Just a question prompted by that “non-Trumper” remark: despite their seriously-bent promoter, are Trump-appointed judges in general any more inclined to egregious bias than the average of the profession…? (Cannon and Rove being notable but possibly rare exceptions?)
There have been several judges appointed by Convict-1 which have followed the law and precedent, these are part of the non-Trumpers. Ones like Kacsmaryk (sp?) in Amarillo and Cannon are Trumpers based upon their actions and rulings.
He doesn’t really want his property back, he just doesn’t want us to use copies of it to prosecute his friend. Unfair!
How can the DOJ justify hanging onto these files so long after declining to prosecute Comey the first time? Can’t Comey’s team get them excluded on that basis, apart from Richman’s motion and the fact that they were produced pursuant to subpoenas unrelated to the current charges?
This is the shit you get when the object is not to get a conviction, but to make your target’s life miserable.
Maybe I’m expecting too much here, but Lindsey the Insurance Lawyer Impersonating a US Attorney — in a formal written filing to the Court — sure strikes me as engaged in illegal conduct.
A court has found her appointment to be invalid, and AFAIK to date the DOJ has not filed a formal appeal of that ruling. Absent an appeal, and an order from the appellate court staying the ruling of the district court, isn’t her signature on this filing fraudulent?
I mean, if I walked into court and filed a motion that represented that I was the US Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, I’m rather sure that someone in authority would be rather put out and have me slapped in proverbial irons.
The short answer is “there’s a Club, and you’re not in it”. But the deference judges show to the government is absolutely baffling to non-lawyers like me. Halligan’s incompetence, that ICE-adjacent guy who repeatedly lied to a federal judge’s face and walked out a free man, the endless frivolous lawsuuts and nonsensical replies to judges’ requests/orders. None of it matters to the judicial system as long as there is a veneer of following the process. Its been very enlightening.
The modus operandi is to keep on pushing the envelope way beyond what the law allows, just to see if anyone actually pushes back. Changing the law by default, absent any substantive resistance. Classic ultra-right tactic.
In the end, a constitution is just a piece of paper unless its provisions are enforced by those charged with defending it. (The previous Soviet one and the current Russian one are models of their kind, but they were/are considerably less useful in everyday life than a roll of toilet paper.)
Oh, and as to further intent, see previous posting by QBF. Even an eventual effective push-back can’t undo all the damage knowingly wrought. But the push-back is necessary all the same. Including here (even though it surely won’t come from any supposed law-enforcement agency).
With the subsequent order inviting a filter protocol, is Judge KK playing cat and mouse with DOJ while the clock ticks on the 6-months to re-indict?