WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Office of the Inspector General at the U.S. Department of Justice has referred its findings on former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe to the U.S. attorney in Washington for possible criminal prosecution, according to a person familiar with the referral on Thursday.
Spokesmen for the Justice Department and its inspector general’s office declined to comment to Reuters, as did a spokeswoman for McCabe. A spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington could not be immediately reached.
Such a referral does not automatically mean charges will be filed, and it would be up to the U.S. attorney’s office to evaluate the referral and decide whether to prosecute McCabe.
The referral, first reported by CNN and the Washington Post, comes nearly one week after the inspector general said it had concluded that McCabe had misled investigators over a decision to break with the FBI’s standard policy and inform a journalist about a probe into the Clinton Foundation in 2016.
McCabe, a frequent target of criticism by U.S. President Donald Trump, was fired last month just hours before he was set to retire.
Reporting by Sarah N. Lynch, Mark Hosenball and John Walcott; writing by Susan Heavey; editing by Tim Ahmann and Marguerita Choy
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