Former FBI Director James Comey testifies in 2017 in front of the Senate Intelligence Committee in Washington, DC.

President Donald Trump's vendetta against former FBI Director James Comey looks likely to fail when the Department of Justice's flimsy indictment reaches a courtroom.

Trump won't really care when that happens. Oh, sure, he'll whine and wail for as long as the case takes to reach a judge – and maybe a jury – that the American justice system we all just watch him rig is really stacked against him and his alleged pursuit of justice for Comey.

But Trump has already won here.

He got what he wanted. He abused his power to push a perceived opponent into a very public and massively expensive predicament. Every dollar Comey spends on legal fees will feel like a triumph for Trump.

You don't have to take my word on that.

President Trump has a long history of weaponizing courts

Just look at how Trump very publicly harangued Attorney General Pam Bondi and the DOJ to charge Comey. Then look at how he's still lining up foes for the federal government to knock down: New York Attorney General Letitia James, U.S. Sen. Adam Schiff, former National Security Adviser John Bolton, former CIA Director John Brennan and billionaire George Soros.

Then look at how Trump has spent years using America's legal system to silence and coerce competitors and critics. Trump, as a real estate developer and casino operator, used money as power to bring often frivolous civil lawsuits that consumed the time and resources of people he regarded as enemies.

Now, Trump doesn't have to dig into his own pockets to pay for punishment. The president's using the power of the federal government for that, funded by the taxes paid by Americans.

Trump, over the years, has been involved in more than 4,000 legal actions before winning his first presidential term in 2016.

Timothy Zick, a professor at William & Mary Law School, put it this way in a March report published by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, a nonprofit civil liberties group known as FIRE: "One lesson Trump likely learned from his litigation experience is that lawsuits can be an effective form of leverage in business and other dealings. Indeed, even if a claim has no or little legal merit, it can be useful in terms of exhausting, intimidating, and silencing opponents."

Now consider what Trump told The Washington Post in 2016, while he was running for president, about suing journalist Tim O'Brien a decade earlier for writing a biography that questioned whether Trump had exaggerated his net worth.

"I spent a couple of bucks on legal fees, and they spent a whole lot more," Trump said. "I did it to make his life miserable, which I’m happy about.”

Here's what O'Brien had to say in a Sept. 26 social media post about the Comey indictment: "An inexperienced prosecutor loyal to Trump, in the job for less than a week, charged Comey ‒ one of her boss’s most-reviled opponents. She did so at Trump’s command and against the urging of her own subordinates and predecessor, who had just been fired."

We're going to hear a lot of that as the Comey case plays out in court. And we should, because it's important.

The case against Comey is weak and based on nonsense

But remember that just getting to this point is a win for Trump, even if his public exhortations ultimately help secure exoneration for the former FBI director.

Comey's two-page federal indictment on charges of false statements and obstruction was filed in the Eastern District of Virginia on Sept. 25 by U.S. attorney Lindsey Halligan, a lawyer Trump appointed to that job three days earlier after he pushed out his former appointee, Erik Siebert, for raising concerns about the viability of the case against Comey.

Siebert is an experienced federal prosecutor. Halligan has no prosecutorial experience. She most recently worked at the White House, pressuring the Smithsonian museums to erase anything Trump found to be "improper ideology."

See the difference? Halligan moved on the former FBI director after veteran prosecutors in her new office said they lacked probable cause to charge him.

Those concerns likely rose from what legal observers see as a fundamental flaw in the Comey case, which centers on testimony he gave in a U.S. Senate hearing in September 2020 when asked if he had "authorized" someone at the FBI to serve as an anonymous source in a news report about an investigation.

A DOJ inspector general report, released during Trump's first term in 2018, said former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe testified in 2017 that he had authorized a leak to The Wall Street Journal and then told Comey about it after it happened. Comey could not have authorized a leak after the fact.

What's the real reason Trump is targeting Comey?

Comey's real crime here, in Trump's view, is that he oversaw the FBI's investigation of Russia's interference in the 2016 presidential election. Comey was on the job when Trump took office in 2017. Trump, early on, demanded a pledge of loyalty. Comey offered honesty instead.

Trump fired Comey less than four months after taking office. A special counsel appointed by then-U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr in 2020 investigated Comey and the FBI's handling of the Russian meddling. That prompted a report critical of the FBI's processes and policies, but no criminal charges were filed against Comey.

But that was Trump's first term, when he was still surrounded by some aides who pushed him to follow the law and not abuse it. Trump shed that sort of sensibility for his second term. It's all about retribution now.

Trump celebrated Comey's indictment, calling it "JUSTICE IN AMERICA!" And he's already attacking the judge assigned to Comey's case for being appointed by former President Joe Biden.

Trump will pretend to be a victim of injustice when his unjust Comey case fails in court. But he won't be able to resist bragging about how much trouble he caused for Comey. That's the whole point here.

Follow USA TODAY columnist Chris Brennan on X, formerly known as Twitter: @ByChrisBrennan. Sign up for his weekly newsletter, Translating Politics, here.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: DOJ's weak Comey indictment will unravel. Unfortunately, Trump has already won. | Opinion

Reporting by Chris Brennan, USA TODAY / USA TODAY

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