Former CIA Director John Brennan and ex-FBI Director James Comey are being investigated for potential criminal conduct related to the 2016 Trump-Russia collusion probe.
The criminal referral involving Brennan was passed to the FBI by current CIA Director John Ratcliffe, Justice Department sources told Fox News Digital.
The investigation into the Obama-era spy chief involves allegations that he made false statements to Congress and is currently underway.
It’s unclear if the FBI’s probe into Brennan, one of 51 intelligence officials who falsely suggested Hunter Biden’s laptop could be Russian disinformation, encompasses more than his alleged false testimony to lawmakers.
Meanwhile, the specific nature of the potential criminal matter involving Comey is unclear but an investigation has been opened.
DOJ sources, however, described the FBI’s view of the role Comey and Brennan played during the investigation of claims that President Trump’s 2016 campaign was colluding with Russia as a “conspiracy,” according to the outlet.
The FBI, CIA and DOJ did not immediately respond to The Post’s requests for comment.
The investigation into Brennan comes a week after the CIA released a “lessons-learned review” of the Obama administration’s spy agencies’ assessment that Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election to help Trump.
Brennan may set himself up to face perjury charges after a new email surfaced in the scathing assessment, The Post’s Miranda Devine reported last week. In the missive, Brennan insisted that the discredited Steele dossier be included, despite strong pushback from the CIA’s two most senior Russia experts, who said it “did not meet even the most basic tradecraft standards.”
Another CIA official warned him that including the dossier risked “the credibility of the entire paper,” but Brennan “formalized his position in writing, stating that ‘my bottom line is that I believe that the information warrants inclusion in the report.’ ”
The report also found that Brennan, Comey and then Director of National Intelligence James Clapper were “excessively involved” in the drafting of the assessment and in a “chaotic,” “atypical” and “markedly unconventional” process, rushed to complete it.
“This was Obama, Comey, Clapper and Brennan deciding ‘We’re going to screw Trump,’” Ratcliffe told The Post last week.
The CIA’s “Tradecraft Review” noted: “The rushed timeline to publish both classified and unclassified versions before the presidential transition raised questions about a potential political motive behind the White House tasking and timeline.”
It also questioned the exclusion of key intelligence agencies and said media leaks may have influenced analysts to conform to a false narrative of Trump-Russia collusion.
The intelligence community further “elevated unsubstantiated claims” by including a summary of the debunked Steele Dossier in its assessment.
Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee paid more than $1 million to the Perkins Coie law firm, which engaged consulting firm Fusion GPS to dig up dirt on Trump.
Fusion GPS, in turn, hired former British spy Christopher Steele, who compiled the salacious dossier.
The CIA review found that Brennan insisted on the inclusion of the Steele dossier, over the objections of two of the agency’s top Russia experts – who said it “did not meet even the most basic tradecraft standards.”
Comey also insisted on the dossier’s inclusion in the intel report, with the CIA’s review noting: “FBI leadership made it clear that their participation in the [intelligence community assessment] hinged on the Dossier’s inclusion and, over the next few days, repeatedly pushed to weave references to it throughout the main body of the ICA.”
Brennan, however, claimed during congressional testimony in May 2017 that the Steele dossier “wasn’t part of the corpus of intelligence information that we had.”
“It was not in any way used as a basis for the Intelligence Community Assessment that was done,” he claimed, while under oath.
Six years later, Brennan testified to the House Judiciary Committee that he did not believe the dossier should have been included in the Trump-Russia report.
“The CIA was very much opposed to having any reference or inclusion of the Steele dossier in the Intelligence Community Assessment,” Brennan told the committee in May 2023, during a closed-door session, according to Fox News.
“And so they sent over a copy of the dossier to say that this was going to be separate from the rest of that assessment,” he added.
