WASHINGTON – Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch will support the recommendations from prosecutors and others leading probes into the use of a private email server by Hillary Clinton during her time as secretary of state, a Justice Department official said.
Lynch’s statement is expected later Friday during a discussion with Washington Post editorial writer Jonathan Capehart at the Aspen Ideas Festival in Colorado.
Such a review process outline by Lynch would remove chances that a political appointee could ultimately decide the fate of the case and potentially overrule the investigators.
A Justice Department official said the attorney general will accept the “determinations and findings of career prosecutors and lawyers as well as FBI investigators and director [James B.] Comey.” The official spoke on condition of anonymity in advance of Lynch’s remarks. The New York Times first reported the expected Lynch comments.
The issue of potential political intervention in the email case has sharpened in recent days after a private – and apparently chance – meeting between Lynch and former President Bill Clinton earlier this week at an airport in Arizona.
Lynch said the meeting was not planned, and occurred when Clinton made a surprise visit to her plane on the tarmac at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport.
Lynch on Wednesday described the conversation as a general chat about “his grandchildren and his travels and things like that.” She insisted that the email probe was not mentioned.
Republicans did not directly challenge Lynch’s account of the meeting, but claimed that it raised the appearance of a possible conflicts of interest and potential blows to the overall integrity of the probe.
The FBI is expected to make recommendations later this month to the Justice Department on the case as Hillary Clinton, the presumptive Democratic nominee, prepares for November’s election.
