New whistleblower reports allege that the FBI conducted investigations specifically targeting pro-life groups, Catholics, and parents who attended school board meetings with the intention behind these investigations to “inflate” the perception that these groups posed a domestic terrorism threat.
During a news conference on Thursday morning, House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) provided details regarding the reports just moments before three FBI whistleblowers were scheduled to testify before the committee. Jordan highlighted the allegations made by the whistleblowers, stating that the FBI’s Washington, D.C., office exerted pressure on the rest of the organization to advance a political agenda.
These allegations raise concerns about potential politicization within the FBI, Fox News reported.
“If you’re a parent attending a school board meeting; if you’re a pro-lifer praying at a clinic, or you’re a Catholic simply going to Mass, you are a target of the government, a target of the FBI,” Jordan said,
He added that some FBI officials wanted to “inflate” such investigations to treat them as domestic and violent extremism cases.
According to Jordan, the House Judiciary Committee has engaged with more than two dozen FBI whistleblowers during the process of compiling its report.
In addition, the whistleblowers reported receiving backlash from the agency for speaking out despite the fact that federal law is supposed to protect them from retaliation.
Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) said much of the “rot” within the agency emanates from the Washington, D.C. field office.
“A lot of the rot, the committee has learned, emerges out of headquarters, out of the Washington field office,” Gaetz said. “[A whistleblower] described the conflict that existed as the Washington field office put pressure on other field offices around the country to engage in law enforcement work without predication.”
Jordan talked about the whistleblowers publicly testifying last week.
“We had a number of whistleblowers come talk to us from the FBI, we’ve actually interviewed six of them,” the Ohio Republican told Fox Business host Larry Kudlow, a former Trump administration official. “We plan on having some of them testify publicly here in the near future because they want to and they have a compelling story to tell and they have been retaliated against. But in this situation, it’s totally up to the whistleblower. That is the way the statute works.”
