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Politicization of FBI Takes Center Stage in GOP House Investigations

Posted on Tuesday, February 28, 2023
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by Andrew Abbott
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AMAC Exclusive – By Andrew Abbott

FBI

As House Republicans ramp up their promised investigations after taking power in January, one emerging theme across a range of probes is potential wrongdoing and politically motivated actions by career bureaucrats at the FBI. From Big Tech censorship to the targeting of religious Americans, Republicans are finally getting answers to questions that have been mounting for more than two years.

The new House panel on the weaponization of the federal government, which held its first hearing on February 9, has already delivered a number of shocking details about left-wing bias in FBI investigations. During that hearing, former FBI Special Agent Nicole Parker testified that the bureau is plagued by “low morale” and has become “politically weaponized.” The hearing further revealed that the agency had lowered eligibility requirements in hiring new agents and aggressively focused on social justice issues following the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests.

The hearing also took aim at the FBI’s collusion with Big Tech to censor conservative voices on platforms like Twitter and Facebook. Jonathan Turley, a professor at George Washington University Law School, testified that, as revelations from the so-called “Twitter Files” show, the FBI is using social media sites to silence anyone critical of Democrats or left-wing media narratives.

In an op-ed for the New York Post following his testimony, Turley pointed to the alarming similarities between the modern FBI-Big Tech censorship and the 1950s “Red Scare,” when the bureau was used to target Americans by accusing them of being communists. “Where the Hoover FBI would call dissenters ‘Communist sympathizers,’ the Wray FBI labels them ‘conspiracy theorists,’” Turley wrote. “The Democratic Party was once the greatest defender of free speech, the greatest critic of corporate power, and the greatest skeptic of the FBI. It is now opposing the investigation into the FBI’s involvement in a massive corporate-run censorship system.”

Opposition from Democrats to Republicans’ inquiries into the politicization of the FBI is increasingly looking to be at least somewhat a matter of self-preservation. Some of the most damning revelations about censorship operations between the FBI and Big Tech relate to the infamous Russia collusion hoax and the Hunter Biden laptop scandal. In both cases, as House Republicans’ investigations have further confirmed, FBI bureaucrats used shoddy intelligence to push a narrative they believed would be damaging to Donald Trump’s chances in the presidential election.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) has also issued a number of subpoenas of top FBI officials and documents relating to scandals from the past two years. Earlier this month, for instance, Jordan’s office gave FBI Director Christopher Wray a March 1 deadline to turn over documents related to the bureau’s labeling of parents who spoke out at school board meetings as “domestic terrorists.”

In addition to exposing political bias within the FBI, the Republican investigations have shone a spotlight on the revolving door between Big Tech companies and the FBI and other federal law enforcement agencies. As revelations like the Twitter Files have revealed, top officials at the FBI often go on to occupy high-level posts at Twitter and other Big Tech companies, where they work closely with their former FBI colleagues on censorship operations. In the case of the Hunter Biden laptop story, for instance, James Baker, who had previously served as FBI general counsel during the bureau’s ill-fated investigation into potential ties between the Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and Russia, went on to serve as Twitter’s deputy general counsel after 2018. At Twitter, Baker was responsible for suppressing the laptop scandal ahead of the 2020 election – again based on flimsy evidence that the story was “Russian disinformation.”

Despite increased scrutiny, it does not yet appear that the FBI is doing anything to counter the perception that the agency has been ideologically captured by the left. Just one day after the first hearing of the weaponization of the federal government panel, a leaked internal FBI memo showed that the bureau’s field office in Richmond, Virginia was labeling “traditionalist Catholics” as potential “racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists.”

Although the Department of Justice quickly denounced the document once it became public, there are still pressing questions that Attorney General Merrick Garland and the White House have refused to address about whether the memo was a one-off or part of a broader pattern of anti-Christian hostility within the FBI. However, for the first time in two years, Republicans finally have the power to compel top officials to give the American people the answers they deserve.

Andrew Abbott is the pen name of a writer and public affairs consultant with over a decade of experience in DC at the intersection of politics and culture.

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Hal-
Hal-
1 year ago

I hate to be a stuck record …. but the FBI should have term limits for the top dog. And so should Cabinet heads (e.g. IRS, CIA, State, etc>) have term limits. Without term limits it tends to entrench bad selections to a long term influence. And also Senators and House Reps should have term limits. But the DemocRat Party and some members of the Republican Party oppose this (their rationale being to keep the system to their personal benefit/advantage).

Bud
Bud
1 year ago

Another example of Washington swamp!
Must be exterminated and revitalized!

A Voter
A Voter
1 year ago

Thanks for the lip service. Sure Republicans will “investigate”. They will find some things. Then afterwards there will be no one held accountable for anything. A waste of taxpayer dollars. Ho hum same old promises, same old results. ZILCH.

Deploreable Sam
Deploreable Sam
1 year ago

All the investigations and committee hearing are really swell, BUT, tell me quick, what the hell will ever come of all this? My first guess is damn little to nothing.
I have my own preferred remedies but I hesitate to express those openly here. They already think I am a terrorist extremest. Oh well.
Have a lovely day, and…
FJB, you know the rest.

jocko
jocko
1 year ago

THE ONCE HONORABLE fbi IS NOW THE liberal’s RUSSIAN, KGB

Ann S
Ann S
1 year ago

The investigation into the FBI is evidence that the democrats want absolute power over the American people.
And destroy America in the process.
WAKE UP AMERICA you are being had by the Democratic regime.

Patricia A Arsenault
Patricia A Arsenault
1 year ago

This will all unravel eventually. They will pay in one form or another. A lot of them should be in jail…period! #AmericaFirst

Kay
Kay
1 year ago

I understand the FBI paid Twitter 3 million dollars to hide the hunter lap top. It is time to shake this organization and start over. We do not need ANOTHER agency with pockets full of cash from socialist democrats

Chuck
Chuck
1 year ago

It’s great that the House GOP members are doing all these investigations (Biden’s criminal family, DOJ and Big Tech collusion, etc.), but we’re almost three months into the year and who has been jailed, impeached, or even charged with anything? Why is this taking so long? Stop dragging your feet and get something done to make America great again! FJB!

johnh
johnh
1 year ago

Trump might think he is friends with Putin, but his comments this week about getting Putin & Valensky in a room & knock heads is probably not going to be taken lightly by Putin. Trump is adding fuel to a raging fire by doing this & does not have the power to do this anyway.

Adonis
Adonis
1 year ago

I think the only way out is to dismantle FBI altogether, and reassign this responsibility and oversight to other agencies. This agency is too far gone to be reformed.

pete
pete
1 year ago

need to put oversight to some others. there is absolutely no oversight over the EPA and the havoc reeked on the power industry since its inception.

David
David
1 year ago

Despite the years of entertainment propaganda on the virtues of the FBI, it has been and continues to be corrupt.

anna hubert
anna hubert
1 year ago

The rot is decades deep

Steven
Steven
1 year ago

It is deeply troubling that not only the FBI but other “intelligence” agencies have become a threat to our freedom. Deep budget cuts and continual, relentless Congressional oversight hearings are Parr of the solution.

Hal-
Hal-
1 year ago

I thought as time progressed during the Trump administration that Trump did not do much more of a clean-out of FBI DemocRat biased and politicized personnel, especially since they had their stingers out against him from the get-go of his administration. He did fire the tall drink of water justifiably … but he needed to do much more of a clean-up than he did. And I still strongly suspect that the FBI personnel are a major phantom feeder of pro-Democrat and anti-Republican news tidbits to the liberal biased media.

David Millikan
David Millikan
1 year ago

Welcome to Nazi America all because of 2020 election fraud.
The FBI (Fascist Bureau of Intimidation) will continue to violate not only the law but our Constitution until Congress defunds and dismantles it.
Until then, expect the New Gestapo to continue to attack Americans and violating our laws and Constitutional Rights.
Especially, if you are Conservative and/or Christian Americans.
Since it seems that if you don’t hate America and agree with Fascist liberals lies they consider you the enemy when they are the True enemy of the United States of America.
Only Socialist/Communist/Fascist hate America.
So, in conclusion…Love the United States of America or Get the Hell OUT.

GTPatriot
GTPatriot
1 year ago

Director Wray is nothing more than a slick politician tied to the establishment and the left.
He will never admit to any wrongdoing. We’re stuck with him unless he is impeached which
means to me that he has this job for life. Wray is Trump’s worst appointment and we will
never get rid of him.

Laura
Laura
1 year ago

Regarding the FBI’s labeling of Catholics as extremists, I don’t trust that the FBI is going to let that one go just because they retracted the “memo” or whatever it was. This seems to be the beginning of an incremental targeting of Christians in America. I hope I’m wrong.

Debbie
Debbie
1 year ago

Enough of the talk where is the action and consequences of their actions

Ronald Burger
Ronald Burger
1 year ago

Thank you AMAC for this and other enlightening posts. I’m sharing this association with everyone I know. God bless you and God help America

sdgorton
sdgorton
1 year ago

It will never happen, but Garland should be impeached, his assets seized and then imprisoned for treason!!!!

Bill R.
Bill R.
1 year ago

Investigations are fine and dandy, but excuse me, I won’t get excited until these criminals are indicted and convicted. Else what good are they?

Gloria
Gloria
1 year ago

The once trusted F.B.I. has now become a dangerous criminal entity. Ted Cruz keeps pounding on them. We need to impeach Garland and Wray, bu sting something passed in the Senate is the issue.. Prayers continue on – or should I rather say Spiritual Warfare. Using the powerful Word of God to break down the wall of evil.

Daniel Penny
biden and harris speaking in black and white
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President Joe Biden, son Hunter Biden and sister Valerie Biden walk across the South Lawn of The White House on July 28, 2024 in Washington, DC. President Biden is returning from a weekend trip to Camp David. (Photo by Michael A. McCoy/Getty Images)

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