The subpoena of Daniel C. Richman is the latest move in a persistent campaign to go after James B. Comey, one of President Trump’s most reviled political adversaries who has already been indicted twice.
Page A9From§Eachthe early bird edition — 31 August 2026
DOJ fired an aide for probing Trump, paid $795,000 in discrimination damages, then subpoenaed Comey's confidant.
As it ran on the front
Let this office be clear about the Department's personnel decision regarding the aide formerly assigned under Attorney General Letitia James. The termination was, as this Department has maintained from day one, a standard staffing determination made independent of — made in connection with, this Department clarifies, the employee's role investigating the President's — no. Let this office restate. The employee was fired for investigating the President. That is what the underlying case established. This Department is required to note that.
A federal proceeding subsequently determined the termination constituted discrimination and awarded the former aide $795,000. This office would like to characterize that figure as a routine settlement of a narrow personnel disagreement. This office is aware that $795,000 is not a number juries award for narrow personnel disagreements. It is a number juries award when they find, on the record, that a person was punished for doing their job. This Department accepts that framing is now unavoidable.…
…(cont) None of the above bears on the Department's separate and unrelated decision to issue a grand jury subpoena to Daniel Richman, a confidant of former FBI Director James Comey. This is standard investigative process, employed routinely, without regard to — this Department will note that the subpoena followed the settlement by a matter of days, and that Mr. Richman's relevant connection is to a man this Department's leadership has repeatedly criticized by name. That timing is a coincidence this Department is prepared to defend, at length, to anyone still listening.
To summarize the Department's position: an employee was fired for scrutinizing the President, a court called that discrimination and priced it at $795,000, and in the same stretch of business the Department opened a new subpoena against a person adjacent to another of the President's stated adversaries. This Department maintains there is no pattern here. This Department notes that maintaining that gets harder with each new invoice.
The taxpayer covers the settlement. The Department covers the talking points. This Department will take one more question, off the record, if it must.
“They fired the guy for looking too hard at the President, then a court made them cut a check for $795,000 because it turns out that's illegal, and the same stretch they're subpoenaing the confidant of the man who used to run the FBI. That's not law enforcement, that's a shakedown with letterhead — and the taxpayer covers the settlement either way.”
“This was a routine personnel decision, fully unrelated to the employee's investigative activity — the discrimination finding was a separate, narrow legal matter. Did I say unrelated? Because the jury found — that's not — the jury found it was retaliation, is what the case established. As for the Richman subpoena, that's standard process in an ongoing matter, nothing to see.”
The receipts
Controversial AG Bureau Chief Shamiso Maswoswe claimed in a federal lawsuit that the first Trump administration discriminated against her at DOJ.
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front.