The quiet collapse of efforts involving James Comey and Letitia James shouldn't be celebrated by either political party.
It should be feared.
Not because of who they are, but because of what it represents.
Once again, the American justice system has been dragged deeper into political warfare, and once again, our nation is weaker for it.
This is exactly what many of us have been warning about for years.
The instinct to use prosecutors, investigations, and courts as political weapons is not new.
But it has escalated to a level that now threatens the stability of the republic itself.
When investigations are launched not because of evidence but because of ideology, when indictments feel more like campaign messaging than law enforcement, the public loses trust.
Once that trust is lost, it doesn't matter who wins the case — the system has already failed.
We saw this play out when political forces tried to cripple Donald Trump through legal harassment rather than defeating him at the ballot box.
That effort failed politically, even when it tied him down legally. And it was never going to work in reverse either.
It actually emboldened him, and he won another term.
Going after Comey or Letitia James in the same way was always destined to collapse under its own weight.
Lawfare Is a Disease, Not a Strategy
Targeting political enemies doesn’t strengthen democracy.
It poisons it. Every time a politician cheers an indictment simply because it hurts the other side, we move further away from equal justice and closer to permanent political retaliation. That’s how banana republics operate.
That's how failing systems behave.
The real damage isn't done to Comey or to Letitia James.
The real damage is done to the country:
—It's done when ordinary Americans stop believing that the law is blind.
—It's done when citizens assume investigations are predetermined, that outcomes are political, and that justice depends on party labels.
That kind of cynicism doesn’t disappear. It builds. It hardens. And eventually, it destabilizes everything.
The Political Ground Is Shifting
At the same time this legal theater has been playing out, the political ground underneath Washington is shifting in ways that most insiders are ignoring.
We are staring straight at a 2026 midterm bloodbath.
History is brutal in its consistency.
The first midterm election after a new president almost always favors the party out of power.
Voters pull back.
—They send a message.
—They rebalance the system.
It has happened time and time again, under Republicans and Democrats alike.
There's no mathematical reason to believe 2026 will be any different.
Recent election results in New York are early warning flares.
The comfortable assumptions about voter loyalty, demographic destiny, and urban strongholds are weakening.
Voters are more volatile, more independent, and more willing to punish dysfunction than most strategists want to admit.
Then there is the political shock of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., stepping away from her role in national politics. Love her or hate her, her resignation is a signal.
She was once seen as an avatar of the most aggressive form of political combat. When even figures like that exit the stage, it suggests exhaustion, not victory. It suggests a movement, and a country, that may be reaching a breaking point with constant warfare.
This Isn’t About the Left or the Right
That’s the truth too few leaders are willing to say out loud. This isn’t about protecting Republicans or shielding Democrats. It’s about protecting the structure that allows disagreements to exist without becoming vendettas.
If every administration tries to imprison the previous one, the country becomes ungovernable. If every prosecutor is viewed as either a weapon or a shield, justice becomes a function of power, not law.
No free nation can survive that for long.
The cases involving Comey and James are not the story themselves. They are symptoms. They are warning signs that the system is being pushed far beyond what it was designed to handle.
And if we don’t learn from that warning, the next phase won’t just be ugly — it will be destabilizing.
The Country Is Running Out of Guardrails
The United States was designed with friction built into the system. Slow processes. Checks and balances.
Cultural norms that restrained behavior even when power made bad behavior possible.
Those guardrails are cracking.
Politicians increasingly see their opponents not as rivals to defeat, but as enemies to destroy. That mindset cannot coexist with a functioning constitutional republic. It can only end in escalation. And escalation always ends in collapse.
The dropped efforts against Comey and Letitia James do not restore faith in the system. They expose how far the system has been dragged into the mud.
The only way forward is not revenge. Not retaliation. Not "your turn now." The only way forward is restraint, accountability, and a return to principle — before the American people deliver their own verdict in 2026.
Very recently, the news broke that A federal grand jury wouldn't "reindict" New York Attorney General Letitia James. This after the grand jury was asked for a second time to weigh mortgage-fraud charges against Ms. James — according to a story on CNN. (See the Newsmax Story here — citing CNN.)
That decision by the grand jury came down after a federal judge tossed the initial indictment.
None of the developments heretofore enumerated, in conjunction with these quite recent court system developments, do anything to engender voter trust or faith in our legal system.
The verdict and judgement at the ballot box may well prove harsher than anyone in Washington could have ever contemplated.
Jim Renacci is a former U.S. Congressman, businessman, and conservative leader dedicated to putting America first. Jim Renacci is a former U.S. Congressman, businessman, and conservative leader dedicated to putting America first. Read More of his Reports — Here.
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