The U.S. Department of Justice has secured a new federal indictment against former FBI Director James Comey, marking the second criminal case brought against him by the Trump administration in under a year. The charges center on a controversial May 2025 Instagram post in which Comey shared a photograph of seashells arranged on a beach to form the numbers "86 47."
According to CNN, citing multiple sources familiar with the matter (who ran to CNN to leak the news), the indictment was returned by a grand jury in the Eastern District of Virginia. It comes after the Justice Department’s first case against Comey-filed in September 2025 and charging him with making false statements and obstructing a congressional proceeding related to his 2020 Senate testimony-was dismissed late last year. A federal judge ruled that the interim U.S. Attorney who brought those charges had been improperly appointed without Senate confirmation.
So - the guy acts as Obama and Hillary Clinton's hatchet man to frame Trump and they're going after the seashell thing... right.
The Seashell Post at the Center of the New CaseThe new indictment revives scrutiny of a social media post that ignited intense backlash last spring. On May 15, 2025, Comey posted a photo on Instagram showing seashells lined up to spell "86 47," captioned simply: "Cool shell formation on my beach walk."
The numbers quickly drew sharp criticism from Trump allies. "86" is longstanding slang-commonly used in restaurants to mean "get rid of," "remove," or "toss out"-while "47" is widely understood as shorthand for President Donald Trump, the 47th president. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem at the time called the post a call for Trump’s assassination and announced a Secret Service investigation. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard publicly suggested Comey should be "put behind bars."
Comey deleted the post the same day and issued an apology on social media, writing that he had assumed the shells represented "a political message" but "didn’t realize some folks associate those numbers with violence." He added: "It never occurred to me but I oppose violence of any kind so I took the post down." He later told interviewers that he and his wife had simply noticed the formation during a beach walk in North Carolina and saw it as a quirky, possibly restaurant-themed joke.
The Secret Service interviewed Comey for several hours in Washington, D.C.-an uncommon step for what many legal observers described as a non-specific social media image.
Political and Legal ContextThe indictment represents a renewed push by Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and the Trump Justice Department to pursue cases against high-profile political opponents. Comey has been a frequent target of President Trump since his firing in May 2017 amid the Russia investigation. Trump has repeatedly accused Comey of helping to "weaponize" the justice system against him and has publicly called for his prosecution.
Legal experts have long expressed skepticism that charges tied to the seashell post would survive constitutional scrutiny. First Amendment protections for political speech are broad, and courts have set a high bar for prosecuting ambiguous or hyperbolic statements as true threats or incitement (see Brandenburg v. Ohio and subsequent true-threat cases). Many analysts viewed the original May 2025 controversy as protected edgy commentary rather than a direct call to violence-especially given Comey’s immediate deletion and clarification.
The first indictment’s dismissal on procedural grounds had already drawn accusations of sloppy or overly aggressive prosecution from critics. Today’s development suggests the administration is undeterred and willing to test the legal waters again with a different set of charges.
Tyler Durden Tue, 04/28/2026 - 14:40Summary:
Idemitsu Maru did not use Larak Channel
Loaded Idemitsu Maru crude supertanker exited Hormuz this afternoon, marking the first such crude transit since the conflict began.
Loaded Mubaraz LNG tanker exited Hormuz earlier this month, also marking the first such LNG transit since the conflict began.
Following the Mubaraz LNG tanker's exit from the Hormuz chokepoint in recent weeks, the first such transit since the conflict began, new ship-tracking data from Bloomberg late Tuesday afternoon show that the first crude supertanker, Idemitsu Maru, is also exiting the critical waterway.
Idemitsu Maru, operated by the tanker unit of Japan's Idemitsu Kosan, marks yet another positive signal for Gulf energy flows, but activity in the waterway remains deeply depressed.
Two key things we must point out: first, the tanker is through; second, the tanker did not transit the Larak Channel, the northern passage through the critical waterway near Iran's Larak Island, close to Qeshm Island.
First Loaded LNG Tanker Clears Hormuz; First Crude Supertanker Attempts ExitWhile all the attention has been focused on President Trump's national security team reviewing an Iranian peace deal that would end the two-month war and reopen the Hormuz chokepoint, while deferring nuclear negotiations to a later date, new vessel-tracking data show that the first loaded LNG tanker has exited the critical waterway since the conflict began, while the first loaded crude supertanker is also attempting to exit.
"The first LNG shipment since the war in Iran began two months ago appears to have slipped through Hormuz," Bloomberg's Stephen Stapczynski wrote in an overnight post on X.
Stapczynski also noted that the Mubaraz LNG tanker was loaded at ADNOC's Das Island facility in Abu Dhabi in early March and turned off its transponder around March 31, only reappearing west of India on Monday.
The latest ship-tracking data from Bloomberg shows that Mubaraz is approaching the southern tip of Sri Lanka, with the vessel signaling China as its port of call.
A separate report from Bloomberg's Weilun Soon identified yet another tanker, this time a Japan-linked supertanker loaded with crude, attempting to become the first crude-laden vessel to exit Hormuz since the war began.
The Idemitsu Maru, operated by the tanker unit of Japan's Idemitsu Kosan, left its holding position near Abu Dhabi late Monday and appears to be exiting the Hormuz chokepoint early Tuesday, according to Bloomberg ship-tracking data.
Both transits are significant. Taken together, they may indicate that a U.S.-Iran framework to end the war and reopen the critical waterway is nearing execution, or that countries such as China and Japan are beginning to see a pathway toward de-escalation.
The latest Polymarket odds of Hormuz traffic returning to normal by May 15 stand at around 15%.
//--> //--> Strait of Hormuz traffic returns to normal by May 15?Latest Hormuz flows via UBS:
Oil & gas tankers passing through Hormuz
Oil & gas tankers exiting Hormuz
All great news.
Tyler Durden Tue, 04/28/2026 - 14:35After the wild success experienced by multiple companies under the Department of Energy's Reactor Pilot Program (RPP) and Fuel Line Pilot Program (FLPP), four new fuel chain and reactor development companies have been selected under the Nuclear Energy Launch Pad (NELP).
JUST IN: @Energy’s @GovNuclear & @NRICnuclear announced the first developers selected for the newly established Nuclear Energy Launch Pad.⚛️
The initiative helps private #nuclear developers move their technologies from concept to commercial deployment. https://t.co/j3rQ0ngPSj
The NELP is the combined successor program to the RPP and the FLPP. The program provides “streamlined pathways for developers wanting to demonstrate advanced nuclear energy technologies and accelerate commercial deployment”.
Some of the reactor developers under the RPP have gone from chalkboard to fully constructed microreactors preparing for going critical in just over a few months, leading to multiple other companies begging for ways to also harness the DOE’s lightning track.
Four companies were selected under the initial round of NELP participants: General Matter, Radiant Nuclear, Deployable Energy, and NuCube Energy. NuCube is entering the program in partnership with Idaho State University.
General Matter is the only non-reactor developer in the program. They are working to build out new uranium enrichment capacity in the country, amid the United States's current reliance on imports from countries like Russia and domestic production controlled by European nations.
Radiant Nuclear is currently progressing a project under the RPP with this new effort under the NELP likely building on the project. After Radiant’s testing is done at the INL DOME, they will likely transition to a different location, either at INL or another DOE-controlled area, to deploy the next iteration of their Kaleidos reactor or work on a yet-to-be-announced design.
Deployable Energy and NuCube Energy are some of the newer entries into the reactor development startup space. Both companies are working on microreactor designs for remote applications, military applications, and potential use for critical loads, including data centers.
Deployable’s design is the Unity Nuclear Battery, a 1 MW high-temperature gas-cooled reactor. NuCube has yet to provide a lot of details as to what their "Deccacell" project is, but a previous filing with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission indicates it may be a heat pipe design similar to designs from Antares Nuclear and Westinghouse.