For the second time in less than a year, the Trump administration has indicted former FBI Director James Comey, this time regarding a social media post he made toward President Donald Trump.
Comey, who was the FBI director when Trump first took office in January 2017, has been a frequent target of the president, who has publicly called for him to face criminal charges.
The new charges against Comey were not clear. However, The New York Times said they were connected to Comey’s social media post from a beach vacation in North Carolina. Comey posted a picture of seashells spelling out “86 47.” The number “86” often means “get rid of” or “dismiss,” typically in restaurants or bars when something is out of stock. The other number referred to Trump as the 47th president.
But the administration claimed the post was a cryptic message inciting an assassination attempt on Trump, The Times reported. Comey eventually took down the post after the backlash and denied any notion that he meant any violence.
“I didn’t realize some folks associate those numbers with violence,” Comey later wrote on social media. “I oppose violence of any kind so I took the post down.”
What happened to the last indictment?
A Virginia grand jury indicted Comey in September, accusing him of lying and obstructing a congressional investigation during testimony in 2020. The indictment received sharp criticism from the legal community after Trump fired the U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, who, along with prosecutors, had determined they lacked the evidence to support Comey’s charges.
Trump replaced the prosecutor with Lindsey Halligan, a former White House aide with no prior prosecutorial experience. Halligan secured an indictment against Comey shortly after her appointment.
In November, a judge ruled that Trump’s appointment of Halligan was illegal and dismissed Comey’s indictment. The judge also dismissed the indictment of New York Attorney General Letitia James, another Trump antagonist.
The Comey case suffered another legal setback when a judge ruled that some evidence was off-limits to prosecutors.
The new indictment against Comey came weeks after Trump fired former Attorney General Pam Bondi. The Times reported that the termination came after advisors grew unhappy with how she handled the files related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and her effectiveness in securing cases against perceived political enemies.