President Barack Obama is prepared to nominate James Comey, a former Bush administration official with bipartisan credentials, as the next FBI director. In a possible warning sign, the top Republican on the Senate committee that would review the nomination said Comey would face questions about his ties to Wall Street.
Three people with knowledge of the selection said Wednesday that Obama planned to nominate Comey, who was the No. 2 official at the Justice Department under President George W. Bush. Comey was general counsel to Connecticut-based hedge fund Bridgewater Associates from 2010 until earlier this year and now lectures at Columbia Law School.
Comey would replace Robert Mueller, who has held the job since shortly before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, which forced the FBI to transform itself into one of the nation’s chief weapons in the war on terror. Mueller’s last day on the job is Sept. 4. The White House may hope that Comey’s Republican background will help him through Senate confirmation at a time when some of Obama’s nominees have been facing tough battles. But Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, the top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, indicated Comey’s confirmation hearing would raise questions about the Obama administration’s investigations of Wall Street. Grassley said in a statement late Wednesday he had not heard from the White House about Comey’s nomination but said Comey possessed a lot of important experience on national security issues.
“But, if he’s nominated, he would have to answer questions about his recent work in the hedge fund industry,” Grassley said. “The administration’s efforts to criminally prosecute Wall Street for its part in the economic downturn have been abysmal, and his agency would have to help build the case against some of his colleagues.” Comey became a hero to Democrats for the central role he played in holding up Bush’s warrantless wiretapping program, one of the administration’s great controversies and an episode that focused attention on the administration’s controversial tactics in the war on terror.
In stunning testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2007, Comey said he thought Bush’s no-warrant wiretapping program was so questionable that Comey refused for a time to reauthorize it, leading to a standoff with White House officials at the bedside of ailing Attorney General John Ashcroft.
Comey said he refused to recertify the program because Ashcroft had reservations about its legality.
Senior government officials had expressed concerns about whether the National Security Agency, which administered the warrantless eavesdropping program, had the proper oversight in place. Other concerns included whether any president possessed the legal and constitutional authority to authorize the program as it was carried out at the time.
