One day after Wray stonewalled Congress, another FBI scandal erupts

Geez. The FBI is a sh!tshow.

The latest revelation about the FBI’s abuse of power stems not from actions taken under FBI Director Christopher Wray, but they are a stark reminder of how abusive the FBI has been over the past…God knows how long. Years? Decade?

Who knows?

Whatever time frame we are talking about, the level of abuse of power is breathtaking. The latest revelation came through happenstance; Google has a policy of notifying users of law enforcement actions taken against their accounts 5 years after the actions are taken. And for Kash Patel, the chief investigator on then-House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, the 5-year limit was reached in late 2022.

https://t.co/ZRvFGEyuGz

— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) July 13, 2023

Just the News reported on the subpoenas and their political nature in December.

As you may recall, Devin Nunes was a bulldog investigating the abuses of power deployed to “get” President Trump by the federal law enforcement and intelligence communities–abuses that have been confirmed after years of denials.

Apparently, the FBI didn’t like that (go figure), and then-Director James Comey’s FBI decided to snoop on Nunes’ committee staffers by subpoenaing their emails without their knowledge.

he House Judiciary Committee on Thursday opened a formal investigation into why the FBI snooped on two Republican House Intelligence Committee staffers during the height of the Russia collusion probe, suggesting the seizure of their private email and records may have been retaliation for the panel’s efforts to expose bureau misconduct.

The letter from Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, to FBI Director Christopher Wray was prompted by reporting in Just the News and the New York Post revealing that Kash Patel, the chief investigator on then-House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes’ team, had his email seized from Google back in late 2017, just before the release of a report that identified significant failures and abuses in the Russia collusion scandal.

Patel and a second unnamed committee investigator were not notified until 2022, five years after the seizure, Just the News reported.

Well Jim Jordan is proving to be as much a bulldog as Nunes was and is opening up an investigation into the subpoenas, asking the obvious question: why did the FBI snoop in the private emails of investigators who were working on oversight into what is now proven to be FBI malpractice in its investigation of President Trump?

Seems like a pretty good question.

FBI Director Wray is proving to be one of Donald Trump’s worst political appointments, a status for which there is a very high bar. Wray has been at least as bad as Comey when it comes to violating the civil rights of Americans, insisting that the FBI hasn’t been doing what it clearly has: targeting American citizens with a censorship regime, labeling ordinary Americans “domestic terrorists,” and going after religious Americans, especially pro-life Catholics.

FBI Director Wray today refused to condemn the FBI’s treatment of Mark Houck.

Here is what actually happened that day, in the Houck family’s own words: pic.twitter.com/h1oIQwfRm5

— Mary Margaret Olohan (@MaryMargOlohan) July 12, 2023

If you had asked me 10 years ago what I thought of the FBI I would have given a mostly positive appraisal, but with growing doubt due to their exaggeration (or worse) of some of their forensic abilities.

Now? I still think that most agents are motivated to do the right thing, although I acknowledge that is a prejudice I have rather than based upon a lot of data.

But the organization as a whole? It needs to be disbanded, shrunk, and rebuilt from the ground up.

I don’t believe the United States can have a functioning law enforcement system without something that performs many of its functions, including federal investigations, data collection, and performing tasks that are simply beyond the scope or capabilities of local law enforcement.

But the FBI has proven to be too inclined to abuse its power–going back to its earliest days, and the tradition apparently continues.

We can overestimate the ability of any bureaucracy to maintain focus on its primary task and retain integrity over time. I think it is in the nature of the beast, whether the organization is public or private. What is distinctive about public bureaucracies is not that they fail over time, but that there is no penalty for failure; indeed, often there is benefit.

The usual response to government failures is to expand power and increase the flow of money to correct problems, leading to ever greater bloat and indifference to failure and even malfeasance. Look at the worst actors in the Crossfire Hurricane scandal. What price have they paid? All the worst actors are heroes to the Left, show up on TV as commentators, and are better off financially now than before.

James Comey is Exhibit A. Even Peter Strzok shows up as a TV commentator.

Jim Jordan at least can make Wray squirm, although he, too, will skate in the end.