Winning. Warlock Wray is gone come January. FBI Director Christopher Wray announced his resignation on Wednesday.
Nuff said.
Tag: FBI
Yes, Virginia the FBI report shows it was a bullet. Not shrapnel.
I’m sure you saw or heard that the FBI director claimed that it may not have been a bullet that hit President Trumps ear, but shrapnel. That set off the crazy loons on X and obscure websites. So what was it?
Well, the FBI came out and said it was a bullet. I understand why the fanatics got it wrong, but for the Director to put out fake news?
FBI confirmed Friday that it was indeed a bullet that struck the former president’s ear, moving to clear up conflicting accounts about what caused the former president’s injuries after a gunman opened fire at a Pennsylvania rally.
“What struck former President Trump in the ear was a bullet, whether whole or fragmented into smaller pieces, fired from the deceased subject’s rifle,” the agency said in a statement.
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Some say Trump will purge DOJ and FBI. I say prosecute top brass in FBI and DOJ. We have seen weaponization of several government agencies and yes it goes back to the Obama years.
Now those same folks are upset that there just may be a payback. Former President Donald Trump will purge the administrative state by firing career bureaucrats from the DOJ and the FBI if he wins reelection.
The difference is that the Trump administration will use actual laws and not hide information from the public the way the Biden justice department has done.
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Weaponization continues. FBI Violate 4th Amendment Rights of Los Angeles Residents by Seizing Hundreds of Safety Deposit Boxes without ‘Any Legal Basis’.
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals found that the FBI violated the Constitutional rights of some Beverly Hills residents by seizing hundreds of safety deposit boxes without ‘any legal basis.’
A class-action lawsuit claims the FBI “exceeded the search warrant approved by the court” when it raided storage provider, US Private Vaults (USPV). The search warrant only authorized the FBI to inspect the safe deposit boxes to “identify their owners in order to notify them” about claiming their property.
But they seized all the contents of 800 boxes. And yes, there are items missing. We have Garland and Biden to thank for this.
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FBI Director Christopher Wray told the House Judiciary Committee in July that the bureau’s actions were limited to “a single field office.” But a report by Judicial Watch tells a different story.
Judicial Watch reported that the 98 pages it obtained through a Freedom of Information lawsuit showed that the FBI memo from earlier this year that tagged some Catholics as violent extremists due to their religious beliefs was reviewed by the agency’s Office of General Counsel. Coordination also took place with Portland and Milwaukee officials.
This is what was uncovered so far. How many other FBI offices may have also investigated and here’s the difference. Conservative Catholics and Catholic groups.
Catholic churches have been attacked more than 200 times since May of 2022.”
Copy of Tracker: Attacks on Catholic Churches Since 2020 – Google My Maps
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Another case of the FBI sitting on their Ass.
Since March of 2021 the FBI is sitting on a case from the state of Michigan where a Democrat operative showed up with 8-10,000 phony ballots. The person wasn’t arrested but the state turned this over to the FBI.
To this day nothing. Why? The person who dropped the phony ballots works for GBI Strategies. Who are they? A group hired by the DNC. Need I say more?
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This is a CBS News report. But why did this come out now? The Report says the Capitol Police knew, so Schumer, the DC Mayor, and Pelosi Knew ahead of time. I’m guessing that if the FBI knew and did tell Trump, that’s why he wanted to send in the National Guard.
Government watchdog report finds FBI, Capitol Police identified but didn’t share “credible threats” before Jan. 6.
Federal agencies responsible for protecting the U.S. Capitol did not “fully process” or share critical information — including about militia groups arming themselves ahead of the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection — a failure that stymied the response that day, according to a new 122-page report by the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office.
The FBI and the U.S. Capitol Police had seen “threats that were true or credible” days ahead of the assault on the Capitol building, the report said. But much as with the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, a failure by multiple agencies to share information and connect dots left those securing the Capitol unprepared for the onslaught.
“Some agencies did not fully process information or share it, preventing critical information from reaching key federal entities responsible for securing the National Capital Region against threats,” the report said.
The GAO report also revealed specific tips that were obtained by some federal agencies ahead of the attack. For example, the Capitol Police obtained information “regarding a tip that a member of the Proud Boys had recently obtained ballistic helmets, armored gloves, vests, and purchased weapons, including a sniper rifle and suppressors for the weapons.”
The tip, which the Secret Service also obtained from its Denver Field Office, revealed the individual flew with others to Washington D.C. “on January 5, 2021” to incite violence. According to the report, the Secret Service interviewed the individual and his son when they arrived in Washington, D.C., and investigated whether they were traveling with “loaded weapons.” Capitol Police also attempted to locate the individual using “cell phone pings.”
According to the report, investigators from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security reviewed a tip a day before the Jan. 6 attacks about an individual who had “staked out parking lots of federal buildings to determine how to bring firearms into D.C. at January 6th events.”
The report also indicates there was a threat against the D.C. water system between Dec. 16, 2020 – Jan. 4, 2021. Information about the threat was obtained by the Architect of the Capitol and was shared with the Capitol Police.
In addition to the Capitol Police and the FBI, five other federal agencies including the Department of Homeland Security, United States Secret Service, Park Police, Senate Sergeant at Arms and Postal Inspection Service “developed a total of 27 threat products specific to the planned events of January 6 prior to the attack on the Capitol,” according to the obtained report. The GAO found that “14 products included an assessment of the likelihood that violence could occur.”
A tip shared by intelligence officials from New York State with their counterparts in Washington D.C., included a social media post where the user “described intent to conduct an attack in Washington D.C. on January 6 — targeting Democratic members of Congress.”
The report singled out the FBI, concluding the agency “did not consistently follow policies for processing tips.”
“FBI officials we spoke with said that from December 29, 2020 through January 6, 2021, they tracked domestic terrorism subjects that were traveling to Washington, D.C. and developed reports related to January 6 events,” said the report. “As of January 6, 2021, FBI officials noted that the Washington Field Office was tracking 18 domestic terrorism subjects as potential travelers to the D.C. area.”
In response to the GAO’s findings, the Justice Department said that the FBI would be working “diligently to address the recommendations in the GAO’s report,” and at the same time, the department would “incorporate GAO’s conclusion that, despite collecting and sharing significant pieces of threat reporting, the FBI did not process all relevant information related to potential violence on January 6.”
“The FBI continues to be introspective regarding its roles in sharing intelligence regarding the event of January 6,” Justice Department official Larissa Knapp said in a letter to the GAO.
U.S. Capitol Police Chief J. Thomas Manger told the GAO his department is “currently drafting policy that will provide guidance for sharing threat-related information agency-wide” and said this policy is “currently under executive review.”
The U.S. Park Police concurred with GAO’s findings, and an Interior Department official stated that the agency is working to update policy by March 2023, regarding the “collection, analysis, and distribution of intelligence information.”
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President Joe Biden’s Justice Department reportedly permitted the president’s personal attorneys to search for classified documents in separate locations without security clearances or the FBI present. I wonder if they realize that the DOJ folks who made this decision will be called to testify, and Biden will have to hire outside lawyers if this goes to a trial. Maybe a sitting President can’t be charged, but Biden’s lawyers can be charged. Tampering with Evidence.
We want to thank the WSJ and Breitbart for this.
WASHINGTON—The Justice Department considered having FBI agents monitor a search by President Biden’s lawyers for classified documents at his homes but decided against it, both to avoid complicating later stages of the investigation and because Mr. Biden’s attorneys had quickly turned over a first batch and were cooperating, according to people familiar with the matter.
After Mr. Biden’s lawyers discovered documents marked as classified dating from his term as vice president at an office he used at a Washington-based think tank on Nov. 2, the Justice Department opened an inquiry into why and how they got there. Mr. Biden’s legal team prepared to search his other properties for any similar documents, and discussed with the Justice Department the prospect of having FBI agents present while Mr. Biden’s lawyers conducted the additional searches.
Instead, the two sides agreed that Mr. Biden’s personal attorneys would inspect the homes, notify the Justice Department as soon as they identified any other potentially classified records, and arrange for law-enforcement authorities to take them.
Those deliberations, which haven’t previously been reported, shed new light on how the Biden team’s efforts to cooperate with investigators have thus far helped it avoid more aggressive actions by law enforcement.
In the week since news reports first surfaced about the documents, the incident has drawn parallels to the discovery of a much larger number of documents at former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home in Florida, which federal agents obtained a warrant to search in August after more than a year of negotiations between Mr. Trump’s lawyers, the National Archives and the Justice Department and after Mr. Trump’s lawyers said all documents had been returned.
Mr. Trump’s supporters have accused the Justice Department of a double standard in treatment; Mr. Biden’s supporters have pointed to the president’s legal team’s cooperation and swift moves to inform the Justice Department of the documents’ discovery as a key difference. Mr. Biden has said he doesn’t know what the documents are or how they wound up at his office at the Penn Biden Center or his Delaware home. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who was director of the Washington think tank from 2017 to 2019, told reporters on Tuesday that he was unaware that government documents had been stored there.
Biden ‘Cooperating Fully’ With DOJ as Garland Appoints Special Counsel
The discussions and the Justice Department’s willingness to let the Biden lawyers do the searches unsupervised also suggest federal investigators are girding for a monthslong inquiry that could stretch well into Mr. Biden’s third year in office.
One reason not to involve the FBI at an early stage: That way the Justice Department would preserve the ability to take a tougher line, including executing a future search warrant, if negotiations ever turned hostile, current and former law-enforcement officials said.
Representatives of the FBI and Justice Department declined to comment. In a call to reporters about the investigation, White House spokesman Ian Sams said the president and his team were cooperating fully with the special counsel review “so that it can proceed swiftly and thoroughly.”
The White House revealed on two separate days last week that documents had been located at the president’s Delaware residence, as well as those found at a garage there in December. Part of the reason the new documents were revealed separately is that Mr. Biden’s personal attorneys don’t have security clearances to handle classified documents and had to set aside any material that could qualify as such. Richard Sauber, special counsel to Mr. Biden, who has that clearance, accompanied Justice Department personnel to retrieve documents, when they discovered additional pages with classification markings.
Attorney General Merrick Garland last week assigned a former top prosecutor in the Trump administration, Robert Hur, to serve as special counsel investigating the discovery of the documents in the locales associated with Mr. Biden. Justice Department officials were concerned that an FBI presence as the Biden team hunted for documents could complicate investigators’ ability to execute search warrants or subpoena documents as the investigation proceeds, some of the people said, in a sign that investigators are considering the possibility of a grand jury investigation into the matter.
Mr. Hur is expected to begin his job as special counsel by the end of the month, after he winds down his work as a defense lawyer at the law firm Gibson Dunn, people familiar with his appointment said.
Robert Hur has been appointed special counsel in the Biden documents investigation.PHOTO: MICHAEL MCCOY/REUTERS
Soon after the initial discovery in November, Mr. Garland tasked the Trump-appointed U.S. attorney in Chicago, John Lausch, with reviewing the documents, with an eye toward determining whether a special counsel should be appointed.
Mr. Lausch told Mr. Garland on Jan. 5 that he thought a special counsel was warranted given the many unanswered questions about the documents, and Mr. Garland quickly agreed, the people said.
Mr. Hur is expected to grapple with legally and politically thorny considerations that could be reminiscent of those from the last special counsel related to a sitting president, potentially including whether to pursue in-person testimony from Mr. Biden. During the 2017-19 special counsel inquiry led by Robert Mueller into Russia’s interference in the 2016 campaign and any links between that effort and the Trump campaign, investigators tried for more than a year to interview then-President Trump before ultimately settling for written testimony.
Mr. Sams declined to say whether Mr. Biden would sit for an interview with the special counsel if asked.
Legal experts said an open-book strategy could help shorten Mr. Hur’s inquiry and keep it from dragging out over Mr. Biden’s presidency.
“My goal would be to get everybody interviewed by Robert Hur as quickly as possible—not throw up roadblocks, not assert privileges, and get this thing over with,” said Neil Eggleston, who served as White House counsel in the Obama administration.
The Justice Department investigation into the Biden documents comes as another special counsel is already deep into a parallel inquiry into the classified documents at Mr. Trump’s Florida home.
Former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home in Florida was searched by FBI agents last year.PHOTO: MARCO BELLO/REUTERS
The FBI in August executed a search warrant at the property, believing more such documents remained there based on witness interviews and security-camera footage. They removed dozens of boxes containing additional documents, many of which were mixed in with clothing and news clippings. Prosecutors later disclosed they were investigating whether anyone sought to obstruct their inquiry, in addition to whether anyone should be prosecuted for mishandling the documents. Mr. Trump has called the Justice Department’s moves a witch hunt and said he did nothing wrong.
The Justice Department has sought to keep the two inquiries separate by assigning them to different teams, according to people familiar with the matter. The Biden White House has highlighted differences between the two inquiries, stressing in particular how their cooperative stance compares to the Trump team’s resistance to turn over records to the National Archives after repeated requests. Mr. Trump’s legal team later clashed with the Justice Department over the appointment of an outside arbiter, known as a special master, to review documents seized from Mar-a-Lago.
Yet the Biden team’s bumpy rollout of its discoveries—it only confirmed the document discoveries after news reports and has offered few new details—complicates its attempt to draw a hard distinction between Mr. Biden’s actions and those of Mr. Trump, said John Fishwick, who served as the U.S. attorney for the Western District of Virginia during the Obama administration.
“He is the sitting president, there’s no reason for him to hold back anything about this,” Mr. Fishwick said. “It makes it harder to say it’s apples and oranges, and it undercuts the argument that you were different.”
—Sabrina Siddiqui contributed to this article.
Write to Aruna Viswanatha at aruna.viswanatha@wsj.com, Sadie Gurman at sadie.gurman@wsj.com and C. Ryan Barber at ryan.barber@wsj.com
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I want to thank fellow writer Matt Taibbi for this great article.
Twitter tried to balk at cooperating with government agencies deemed “political.” In the end, it allowed everyone access through the FBI “Belly Button”
In the first week of May, 2020, at the peak of Covid-19 panic, Twitter senior legal executive Stacia Cardille received a communication from the Global Engagement Center (GEC), the would-be operational/analytical arm of the U.S. State Department. Founded in the Obama years under Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the GEC was like the State Department’s wannabe version of the NSA or the Defense Intelligence Agency.
Appended to an attachment with a long list of names was a note from the GEC — remember, these were the Trump years — that read, in part:
We are providing these 5,500 accounts that display inorganic behavior and follow two or more of the 36 Chinese diplomatic twitter accounts that we have identified in the report. Due to the fact that these accounts follow two or more of these diplomatic accounts, and a good portion of them are newly created, we believe that they are suspicious.
Let’s stop right there. You do not need to have a legal background to see that something doesn’t look right. Why would a Federal agency send a public company this type of information? Why would you not do your own investigation to see if any laws are being broken?
Twitter should have brought in legal experts to see if this was true. And if it was, why wouldn’t the federal agency turn this over to the DOJ?
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Thanks to Musk, we now know the so called conspiracy theories were actual facts. So everything about the FBI and Twitter working together was true. The shadow banning, banning, exchanging information and Twitter being paid to block people and information.
What was pathetic was the FBI statement saying they only made recommendations. Let’s say that’s all they did. Why would a government agency be making suggestions on who to ban or what information should be allowed?
This from Musk.
“To be totally frank, almost every conspiracy theory that people had about Twitter turned out to be true. Is there a conspiracy theory about Twitter that didn’t turn out to be true? So far, they’ve all turned out to be true. If not more true than people thought.”