There's a secret reason they charged Comey. It's worse than the charges themselves.

The arrest warrant gave away the game. Donald Trump doesn't want a prosecution or a successful conviction. He wants a mugshot.

Yesterday, after he was charged with crimes over an Instagram post, an arrest warrant was issued for the former FBI director. It accidentally revealed the secret reason Trump wants him charged again.

Last fall, something truly unprecedented happened. And a teeny-tiny (yet crucial) detail casts a whole new light on what’s happening right now with ex-FBI leader James Comey.

At 6:44 p.m. on Saturday, September 20th, the president of the United States posted a directive on Truth Social urging his Attorney General to accelerate the prosecution of his critics. That list included Comey. In less than a week, the Justice Department followed suit. Two felony charges were announced against Comey in a case that shocked the world.

Trump should have been pleased. But something happened that clearly infuriated him.

Not long after the charges were announced, news outlets revealed that an FBI agent declined to “perp walk” Comey — in other words, to have him arrested in front of the cameras and taken to be fingerprinted and photographed. Higher-ups had requested “large, beefy” agents in “full kit” be recruited to go pick Comey up. Yet the agent reportedly found the instruction inappropriate, since Comey had only received a summons from the court and not an arrest warrant. As former U.S. Attorney Barb McQuade noted, it would have been a violation of DOJ policy to go seize Comey in dramatic fashion, given the circumstances.

Comey voluntarily went to the courthouse without spectacle.

For that, the FBI agent was promptly fired. In an expletive-laden social media post, FBI director Kash Patel didn’t deny that the employee had been canned for refusing to “perp walk” the former director. Indeed, Patel seemed to use the episode as a warning:

“Follow the chain of command,” he wrote, “or get relieved.”

I wonder: had Kash Patel received an angry phone call? Perhaps from someone who wanted to see an enemy in handcuffs? Someone who wanted to watch a foe forced to get a mugshot like he’d been forced to do? Someone who was infuriated when no mugshot appeared on cable news?

Which leads me back to James Comey’s indictment yesterday.

It’s been reported for months that DOJ has been trying to find some other reason to bring charges against the FBI chief-turned-critic. Finding nothing else to go on, the Department evidently decided to charge him with threats against the president on the patently ludicrous theory that Comey’s Instagram post — of seashells on a beach formed into the numbers “8647” — was an assassination threat. “86” is slang for “throw out.” “47” means “47th president.”

Most of the coverage the past twelve hours has focused, rightfully, on how idiotic the case is. Even Trump’s legal commentator flunkies have cast side-eye at the case.

But what’s missing is any discussion of the arrest warrant. To me, that is what gave it all away.

Arrest warrants don’t come out of nowhere. After prosecutors put an indictment in front of a grand jury, they have a choice. If the grand jury approves the charges, prosecutors can seek a “summons” or an “arrest warrant” from the court. Typically, if a subject isn’t a high risk, they’ll simply be summoned to appear. But if there’s a worry that the subject might flee or cause harm, an arrest warrant will be issued.

None of those conditions apply here. Comey isn’t a flight risk; he showed up voluntarily at his last arraignment only seven months ago. And the suggestion that he’s a danger to the public is laughable on its face. Nonetheless, an order to arrest him was sought by DOJ and sent to the U.S. Marshals, who are presumably working on how and when to carry it out. The obvious upshot of such a warrant is this: Comey will be publicly arrested, ceremoniously fingerprinted, and most crucially, placed in front of a camera for a mugshot.

After that, I suspect Donald Trump doesn’t care whether DOJ wins or loses the case. He doesn’t care that Comey’s social media musings are quite obviously First Amendment protected speech, or even that his own allies have made similar posts against former presidents. What Donald Trump cares about is that he’ll get a mugshot of James Comey.

But it won’t stop there. As I’ve said for the past year, Trump’s goal is to build a kaleidoscope. He won’t cease his revenge campaign at least until he’s secured arrest warrants and mugshots for as many of his foes as possible. He wants to create a montage of mugshots, in fact, much as was done to him and his henchmen. Like the one below.

The only difference, of course, is that Trump’s hand-crafted montage will be built on false allegations, defamation, and outright lies. Lies so heavy that they will sink every case to which they’re tied. And if we don’t decry them loudly enough as a country, those lies will be heavy enough to sink the Constitution, too.

Your friend, in defiance,

Miles Taylor

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