Trump Preparing to Fire FBI Agents Who Treated a Violent Attack on Congress as a Crime
Emil Bove, the Trump defense attorney who is serving as the Acting Deputy Attorney General until Trump installs another of his defense attorneys in the post, is preparing to purge up to 6,000 FBI Agents who participated in the investigation into the crime scene on January 6.
Bulwark has a good summary and links to other coverage.
Emil Bove, Trump’s former defense lawyer, who is now acting deputy attorney general and in charge of the Justice Department, ordered the removal of at least six top FBI career executives. Bove also requested the names of all FBI agents who worked on January 6th cases.
[snip]
Over the weekend, in a blizzard of activity (helpful reporting can be found here, and here, and here), FBI officials moved to resist the attempted coup.
Though he had carried out the order to decapitate the bureau’s top executives the day before, on Friday acting FBI Director Brian Driscoll reportedly refused to agree to fire certain agents involved with January 6th cases, and was trying to block a mass purge of such agents. In a message to staff Saturday, Driscoll reminded FBI agents of their rights to “due process and review in accordance with existing policy and law,” and emphasized “That process and our intent to follow it have not changed.”
The FBI Agents Association sent a memo to employees over the weekend to remind them of their civil service protections. The memo urged them not to resign or to offer to resign, and recommended that agents respond to one question in the survey they’ve been instructed to answer: “I have been told I am ‘required to respond’ to this survey, without being afforded appropriate time to research my answers, speak with others, speak with counsel or other representation.”
And in a remarkable letter, obtained by The Bulwark, the president of the Society of Former FBI Agents—a group that seeks to stay out of politics—said the following:
The obvious disruption to FBI operations cannot be overstated with the forced retirement of the Director, Deputy Director, and now all five Executive Assistant Directors. Add in the immediate removal of a number of SACs [Special Agents in Charge] and the requests for lists of investigative personnel assigned to specific investigations and you know from your experience that extreme disruption is occurring to the FBI—at a time when the terrorist threat around the world has never been greater.
Then on Sunday the top agent at the FBI’s New York field office, James Dennehy, wrote in an email to his staff: “Today, we find ourselves in the middle of a battle of our own, as good people are being walked out of the F.B.I. and others are being targeted because they did their jobs in accordance with the law and F.B.I. policy. . . . Time for me to dig in.”
What no one is saying in their coverage, however, is that Trump — through Bove — is effectively trying to remove thousands of FBI Agents because they treated a violent attack on the Capitol, one that put Members of Congress at real risk (as the video of Chuck Grassley fleeing, which Kyle Cheney first discovered, shows).
This mob wasn’t just coming after Mike Pence and Nancy Pelosi (and AOC) by name. They were also coming after Mitch McConnell by name. As I’ve shown, Ryan Nichols was calling to drag every member of Congress who certified Joe Biden’s win, which includes Grassley, Lindsey Graham, and John Cornyn.
Trump is trying to make it a firing offense for the FBI to investigate people — including some adjudged terrorists — who attacked a co-equal branch of government.
And thus far, Senators who could stop it have done nothing.
Purging these agents will not just devastate the FBI workforce, throwing away decades of expertise. But it will also send a message that Trump can sic a mob on Congress with no response from law enforcement.
“And thus far, Senators who could stop it have done nothing.”
I assume you mean GOP senators, because I don’t see how their outnumbered Democratic colleagues could stop any of this. But what could even Republican senators do in the face of such illegal overreach?
The GOP senators could (pretty much) stop the coup dead in its tracks in short order. All they need to do is start multiple committee hearings on Trump’s/Musk’s illegal actions, and start rejecting his nominees.
Obviously, that’s not going to happen at this point, given they have become his toadies. But it is certainly within their power (and their constitutional responsibility) to do so.
Fundamentally, they still fear MAGA in the primaries and that is more compelling to these spineless dweebs than love of country. Look how Joni Ernst caved to a primary threat. Wasn’t she a survivor herself?
Is adjacency to power so overwhelming, even if it’s toothless experience with no power, that no Republican senator can envision themselves as a hero to history, even those not intending to tun for reelection? I’m just gobsmacked by the total absence of guts
Sob sister.
crankyOldGuy:
Your response (which lays out an indisputable truth) made me realize I should have phrased my question differently. What I meant was, what can *any* senator do to *directly* address such illegal overreach when it occurs outside of congressional purview?
What does Trump have on the GOP members of Congress?
They are gladly willing to give up their responsibilities as members of Congress.
They are gladly willing to give in to a clear fascist to take over the country (don’t most of these people have children?).
They are gladly willing to accept any insult thrown their way and prostrate themselves to a wannabe dictator.
Are they willing to allow the destruction of the country that is now in progress?
Their fear of the maga base and being primaried .we won’t have democracy by the 28 elections and certainly no real elections in 26 or 28.
and they fear the death threats.
Seems so.
I think they’re all compromised. We know that the NRA acted as a “Foreign Asset” to Russia ahead of the 2016 election. We know how deeply entangled the GOP as a whole is with the NRA. We know of a group of GOW lawmakers who all celebrated the 4th of July, 2018 in Moscow. As they say, a spoonful of tar spoils a barrel of honey.
We’re in uncharted territory. Will people accommodate the take over for the sake of their paychecks? Every government employee who takes an oath is going to be, soon, faced with a decision.
The move from the rule of law to the law of the ruler hopefully will face intense resistance from the law-keepers and some lawmakers. As for the citizenry. . .?
GOP spines seem to be in short supply.
Wait until they get Donnie or President Musk mad at them, and their paychecks get “lost”. Or until their constituents discover how much of what they buy is from Canada, Mexico, or China, and start complaining about prices going up *a lot*.
It appears Canada is targeting the red states to get the point across.
As of right now: Dow down 100 – 150 after opening down 500+, the other major indexes are down around 0.7 to 1.1 %. Notably, Convict-1 has paused his tariffs on Mexico for a month today, which makes the claim of exigent circumstances even more bogus. It’s either a fire burning or it is not.
If I were suspicious, I would wonder who shorted the market this morning.
Yes, the federal government has decided there is no point in making life difficult for States which voted for Democrats. There are States which voted for Trump and put him into office.
There has always been a fair amount of co operation between the State of Washington and B.C.
A few years ago the Governors of Washington, Oregon, and California met with Premier John Horgan to discuss a rail way system connecting all of us. Yes, it would be very expensive but it would take a lot of freight trucks off the highways and cars. Europe and China have extensive railway systems. We might want to get on board with that.
This seems smart strategy to me. Are you Canadian?
Indivisible, Move On, and other groups are mobilizing to get Democratic Senators to use this Senate roadblock game plan the Republicans developed in response to Obama’s 2008 win:
https://bsky.app/profile/ezralevin.bsky.social/post/3lh7kpovdm22c
Turn about being fair play.
Dem congress seems to have completely checked out.
Ironically, I’m beginning to think that the Supreme Court overruling Chevron in June 2024 might turn out to be useful.
Upon a cursory look at the Civil Service Rules in the CFR, I’m seriously wondering if there are major built in vulnerabilities that nobody ever realized because it wasn’t written to assume there would be the extent of corruption and bad faith we face today.
Just right off the bat there is the reference to the power of OPM in this rule:
§ 1.2 Extent of the competitive service
It occurs to me that Musk and the Heritage Foundation and many others are using this vulnerability. Remember, Rebekah Mercer and Peter Thiel are two of the donors of the Rockbridge Network, which has aspirations to fund and build a future Republican administration. So, they may also be aware of this
eCFR :: 5 CFR Chapter I Subchapter A — Civil Service Rules
https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-5/chapter-I/subchapter-A
eCFR :: 5 CFR Chapter I Subchapter B — Civil Service Regulations
https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-5/chapter-I/subchapter-B
Many thanks for those cites and links.
SL, you have given us the keys to a goldmine. “Prohibitions on Political Activity,” for example, provides a single, brilliantly concise paragraph that in essence tells Elon Musk he can take his entire project and shove it.
Thank you for everything you do.
I love the USA. I really don’t want to see it go down the tubes because of greed, pride, cowardice and stupidity. Thank you for all you do, as well, Ginevra!
There’s also this:
“Hatch Act Overview”
“The Hatch Act, a federal law passed in 1939, limits certain political activities of federal employees, as well as some state, D.C., and local government employees who work in connection with federally funded programs. The law’s purposes are to ensure that federal programs are administered in a nonpartisan fashion, to protect federal employees from political coercion in the workplace, and to ensure that federal employees are advanced based on merit and not based on political affiliation.”
https://osc.gov/Services/pages/hatchact.aspx
slightly off-topic: Rolling Stone published this anonymous op-ed from a USAID staffer:
Elon Musk Is Permanently Deleting Government Agencies
Its paywalled, but important enough to read via workarounds. If Americans don’t figure out how to stop Musk soon, like in the next few days, it may be too late.
A career Civil Service employee cannot simply be fired without cause. Even in a RIF, those career employees have a right to re-employment when a position that they are demonstrably qualified to assume comes open. The colloquial term for those employees applying for a different, but somewhat similar position, was being on a ‘Block List’, which requires that the list blockers have ‘first dibs’ on the position.
The order of re-employment, as well as RIF, is the same, from first hired on the Block List to last RIF’d.
1. Career employees in categories 1,2,3
2. Disabled military veterans and non-disabled veterans
3. Years of service and performance evaluations
Career and ex-military is a sure re-hire in very short order
The point of this is, the admin has tried to take a big bite, and I think it’s going to choke.
The point of my comment above (11:49) is that the Civil Service Rules give OPM discretion. Now that bad actors have the reins of power, they can exercise discretions that honorable people did not take into consideration before. That’s why I think it might now be useful that the Supreme Court overruled Chevron in June 2024.
Russ Vought author of Project 2025 is the nominee for OMB. He is cruel and dangerous. To civil servants he wants to “put them in trauma.” ProPublica wrote an article in October 2024 of previews to coming attractions.
https://www.propublica.org/article/video-donald-trump-russ-vought-center-renewing-america-maga?
The lack of response from our Republican representatives is a reflection of their complicity in the events surrounding the January 6th insurrection. They all risk serious jail time if their involvement is revealed. If a bloodless coup will keep them out of jail, so be it.
The question is how far have the gloves come off? Paper airplanes made of law will be worthless without willingness and ability to enforce and the other side is using Blackhawk gunships. Will this really get down to which side is the US Army is on?