From the Right
By Don Schmitz
Opinion Columnist
Lady Justice is blind and balanced, but the FBI and DOJ appear neither. This column isn’t about the latest Trump investigation, and whether the FBI should have descended on his home. Pundits are endlessly pontificating already on both sides of the aisle, speaking with great authority about whether Trump committed felonies, or is the victim of a weaponized federal law enforcement system.
Truth of the matter is, both might be true. The DOJ is investigating whether he took top secret documents breaking the law, but as president he had absolute authority to declassify anything he wished, which is part of the swirling debate. I raise that to provide context; compared to the wild accusations of treason and collusion with Russia to sway the 2016 election, this pales in comparison. Remember the breathless accusations, and how the Trump campaign was spied upon before and after the election by the FBI?
FBI assistant director Peter Strzok worked on the Mueller investigation, until he was fired when his text messages to his mistress surfaced stating “We’ll stop Trump” from being president, and that they had an “insurance policy” if he was elected. FBI Director James Comey admitted under oath to the senate Judiciary Committee, he had leaked “official FBI records” to reporters, memos he kept at his home safe. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance (FISA) Court surveillance warrants the FBI submitted to spy on Trump organization were found by the inspector general to be rife with “factual misstatements and omissions”.
FBI attorney Kevin Clinesmith pleaded guilty to altering documents to obtain the FISA warrants, a felony. He was given probation. Rep Adam Schiff assured us in 2018 that the “FBI and DOJ did not ‘abuse’ the FISA process … ,” but in fact they did, and admitted it when caught. 14 FBI officials were investigated, censured, suspended, or fired. Quintessential law enforcement malfeasance. Always unacceptable, frightening when it’s a powerful federal agency, stunning when directed at the presidency.
This stands in stark contrast to the FBI’s handling of the Hillary Clinton emails which she illegally kept on her private server, including Top Secret/Special Access documents, to which “hostile actors” gained access. In their decision not to recommend prosecution of presidential candidate Clinton, it was noted that it could be concluded that she was in violation of 18 U.S. Code 1924 “clearly intentional and willful mishandling of classified information,” precisely what is being contemplated as a charge against potential candidate Trump.
Clinton deleted 33,000 emails after receiving a subpoena, claiming they were “personal” emails, destroyed phones and laptops. Common citizens would be charged with obstruction of justice for such actions. It is contemplated that Trump could be charged with obstruction of justice for not turning over the files he kept in his home, yet there is no legal difference between electronic and paper government documents.
We never witnessed the spectacle of FBI agents raiding the Clinton home, nor should we have, but the pictures from Mar a Lago are disturbing, and unprecedented.
This discussion isn’t about moral relativity, the Clintons or the Trumps. It is about whether our FBI and DOJ have become partisan and are tipping the scales in the political arena, a dagger at the heart of a free republic. There is no question that the FBI acted immorally during the Trump investigations before and after the 2016 election. Regardless, despite the Mueller investigation concluding no laws were broken by the Trump campaign, House Democrats voted to impeach, though the Senate acquitted him. They impeached him again after he had lost re-election, with the clear intent of precluding him from ever running again. Again he was acquitted by the Senate.
Now they are trying to ascribe to Trump legal responsibility to the dark day of Jan. 6. The Democrats are tenacious, frustrated with Attorney General Merrick Garland for not filing charges against Trump, and have publicly demanded he do so. Intense pressure from the politically powerful is raining down on the FBI and DOJ.
I grew up lionizing the FBI, founded in 1908 in part to combat corrupt local politicians and police forces. We need them for so many reasons, including corrupt federal leaders.
The FBI is not above reproach and scrutiny, however. FBI director Edgar Hoover, whose name is on the FBI headquarters building, purportedly engaged in illegal wiretaps, burglaries, and forged documents. He targeted Martin Luther King and President John F. Kennedy, blackmailing them over their adultery.
On the heels of all of this, can reasonable liberals understand the trepidation of conservatives? In the 1970s and during the Trump administration, the FBI abused its substantial powers. We aren’t a “banana republic”, and the FBI aren’t “gestapo,” but repeated efforts to overtly impede a political figure from running for office with a double standard application of the law and procedures is deeply disconcerting.