Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) has called for former FBI Director James Comey and disgraced FBI official Peter Strzok to be jailed following the disclosure by former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne that both were involved in urging him to pursue a romantic relationship with alleged Russian spy Maria Butina.
“The feds should let Maria Butina out of jail and put James Comey and Peter Strzok in her cell,” Massie wrote on Twitter, before linking to a Fox News interview where Byrne exposes the FBI’s sting operation.
Butina, who is currently serving 18 months in federal prison for conspiracy to act as an unregistered foreign agent, dated Byrne for a period during which she was under investigation. During the interview, Byrne claimed FBI officials encouraged him to continue pursuing his relationship with Butina, and revealed that the FBI was aware of her desire to reach out to the 2016 Donald Trump presidential campaign and made no attempt to prevent her doing so.
“It became like this even to the point I was telling them things like, look, she’s telling me that in a manner of weeks, she’s going to be at some conference of — of conservatives and Donald Trump is going to be taken down and out the back door of his hotel and be taken to meet her and this and that, what do you want me to do? Can I — let me take her off for a trip and swish her away to the Bahamas or what do you want,” Byrne said. “And they said, no, we’re going to let it all happen.”
“They told me to break up with her, I was stage four and stuff, they came back and this time they specifically said, we need you to conduct a romantic — rekindle your romantic relationship and the orders are coming from X, Y, Z,” Byrne later added, referring to undisclosed senior Obama administration officials whom he said that he has since informed current Attorney General William Barr of.
