What The Peter Strzok Firing Actually Means

On Monday, FBI agent Peter Strzok — the agent who presided over both the Hillary Clinton email investigation and the Russian election interference investigation while texting with his mistress about stopping President Trump — finally got the axe. The Department of Justice Inspector General report on the Hillary investigation was highly critical of Strzok, stating that his texts “potentially indicated or created the appearance that investigative decisions were impacted by bias or improper considerations,” and added that Strzok’s behavior “not only indicative of a biased state of mind but, even more seriously, implies a willingness to take official action to impact the presidential candidate’s electoral prospects.” The report found that Strzok’s decision to prioritize the Russia investigation over the Hillary investigation could have been biased: “Under these circumstances, we did not have confidence that Strzok’s decision to prioritize the Russia investigation over following up on the Midyear-related investigative lead discovered on the Weiner laptop was free from bias.” The report concluded that Strzok’s activities were “antithetical to the core values of the FBI and the Department of Justice.”

So, it was beyond time for Strzok to go.