Gov. Rick Snyder and Attorney Gen. Bill Schuette.
There's no great love between Gov. Rick Snyder and Attorney General Bill Schuette, who has gone after the Snyder administration in the criminal probe involving the Flint water crisis.
Then there's the fact Snyder is backing his Lt. Gov. Brian Calley in the governor's race in which Schuette is regarded as a front runner.
With all that being said, Snyder on Monday issued a statement regarding the Ingham County Prosecutor's Office's decision to forward to the FBI a request for a criminal investigation into Schuette.
“This is clearly a serious matter if the local prosecutor felt it should be referred to the FBI for investigation,” Snyder said in a statement released by his communications director, Ari Adler, Paul Egan of the Detroit Free Press reports.
“It’s important that the FBI be allowed to do a thorough investigation without any undue influence and let the facts take them wherever they lead.”
It all began when East Lansing attorney Mike Nichols complained to the Ingham County Prosecutor's office, alleging that Schuette’s used state employees to witness personal real estate transactions in his state-funded office and his hiring of Republican campaign operatives to taxpayer-funded civil service posts in the run-up to his current campaign for governor, the Freep reports.
The prosecutor's office forwarded the allegations to the FBI.
In such cases, the bureau often does a preliminary investigation to see if a full one is warranted. If it is, the U.S. Attorney's Office then determines if charges should be filed.
