The director of the FBI has a rare privilege in Washington in that the position has a fixed ten year term that is kept largely outside the political world. In 2017, then President Donald Trump appointed Christopher C. Wray to the job and President Biden kept him in place to serve through 2027. Now it appears as though soon to be President Trump may fire the man he originally appointed. It looks bad on several levels.
If this happened in a foreign nation you would assume that the new incoming president was worried about current investigations and possible problems going into the future. But Donald Trump just won a massive election that largely cancels out all previous criminal concerns. So why would Trump worry?
Firing Chris Wray likely represents a need for revenge and, even worse – a need to control the position. President-elect Trump won, period – that is all the “revenge” a person should need. Anything else is purely personal, we expect presidents to rise above such a need. As for control itself, we obviously don’t want a president who specifically sends the cops out against his enemies while protecting his friends without regard to what is and what isn’t a crime.
There is also another consideration. The FBI is doing a great job of late and it has done so without a hint of political motivation. Yes, it went in and searched Mar-a-Lago, by my God – did they ever ever warn him. Trump got more chances over more years than anyone else might expect. More importantly, the FBI then also went in and busted President Biden for having similar types of files – though without the repeated requests to hand them back, and Biden then did immediately return them. The FBI investigated Hunter Biden to the point that Hunter is now fighting serving prison time. It goes beyond even that.
The FBI protected the Trump campaign at least twice with respect to plots to hack access to the campaign’s email system. Not for nothing but the Bureau has also busted Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez, it did the investigation which led to the largest fine in history when finding TD Bank engaged in money-laundering operations, we have not had a major terrorist attack on U.S. soil, arrested the man who released thousands of secret Pentagon files, among many other apolitical operations.
Now it appears that Donald Trump is on the brink of naming Kash Patel – one of his most loyal supporters to the post, though some doubt that the Senate would confirm Patel. He certainly sounds like someone vying for the position. According to NBC News, Patel has quite the agenda:
In his memoir, titled “Government Gangsters,” Patel called for a “comprehensive housecleaning” at the Justice Department and the FBI, including firing many in leadership and prosecuting those who “in any way abused their authority for political ends… We have to put in all-American patriots top to bottom.”
The quote sends shivers down the spine for many reasons but in part because it assumes that the Bureau isn’t already staffed by patriots and allows Patel to personally define who is and who is not loyal to the country. One dearly hopes that the definition doesn’t begin and end with support for Donald Trump. Such a pretext would turn the nation upside down, virtually criminalizing any dissent as somehow being disloyal to the country itself.
Katel goes on to say that they must prosecute anyone involved in the 2020 presidential election, one that he has already determined to be rigged. Most would wait until talking to the people who investigated the matter and found nothing – per then Attorney General Bill Barr along with every private investigator since.
It sure appears as though Donald Trump is willing to politicize law-enforcement – something that would be entirely consistent with an authoritarian dictator. Dictators always quickly ensure that they are not targeted for any criminal investigation and – more importantly, dispatch agents to settle political scores across the board. It sounds as though it could happen here.
The other question is why? Donald Trump just got all the political revenge he will ever need. He won a mandate, easily clearing the popular vote by five million. Why doesn’t he just get to work in doing what he wants with respect to national policy? He is taking a huge risk in looking more petty than confident, more vindictive than successful, and more personally distracted than nationally focused. If President-elect Trump spends too much of his energy prosecuting people on the other side, the public may not support the changes that Trump promised to make regarding actual policy. The public usually isn’t caught up in the personal.
IF the FBI investigates itself or those involved in previous terms and finds crimes, by all means – prosecute, that’s their job. But assuming that the prior election was “rigged” (Why would successful riggers not continue in 2024 if it were so easy?) and then self-defining what it means to be a patriot doesn’t sound like someone looking for a crime so much as a cause. It is exceedingly dangerous.
Perhaps this won’t come to pass. After all, Wray certainly does have a record of going after Democrats and big money interests when needed. Donald Trump did appoint Wray. Keeping him legitimizes those crimes that the FBI does find, whether looking back or forward. Keeping Wray signals that Trump intends to go forward without any need to protect himself or others.It would be the smartest move, by far.
But for now, it looks like Director Wray will soon be out the door and likely accompanied by many of the top current agents. It is dangerous to lose that much institutional memory and experience. Terrorists do still populate this world and we do not want to criminalize political dissent. Of all the possible changes on the horizon, this might be the scariest.
It is also another move that would take decades to undo.
God Bless: I can be reached at [email protected] and @JasonMiciak
What an odd ambition to have in life, the “absolute” power of being a Trump loyalist and getting a position in his #47 administration! Can even this group of butt-lickers think that their lives will be anything other than beating up on people below while they look over their shoulders in fear waiting for the blows to come to them? The only one in Trump’s administration with any power is Trump. Every one of his appointees has already felt his lash at one time or another. Good luck living that kind of life and good luck to your families and pets when you take it out on them…I’m looking at you, Kristi Noem!!
They only have to piss him off once by explaining that he can’t do.something because it is unconstitutional,,and they’ll be history.
We will of course have to see if Trump actually does this. If Wray is in fact fired I believe your suggesting that petty vindictiveness would be a likely reason would in fact be THE reason. Not to mention if would be an awfully high profile decision of Trump announcing himself as being by god “the man” and anyone who doesn’t beg to obey at all times will find their head on the chopping block.
There’s one huge thing Wray did for Trump you didn’t mention. He killed the investigation of Kavanaugh when Brewski Brett’s confirmation was in real trouble. There’s more to that whole process starting with the opening on the court than meets the eye. Kennedy’s resignation came out of the blue – he’d already hired clerks for the new term that wouldn’t start until Oct. It was a typical Court way of quashing the “will he or won’t he retire” speculation that had been going around. He had every intention of staying on, the suddenly BOOM. He retired. His former clerk Kavanaugh was on that Federalist Society list Trump promised to use for appointments and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know a deal had been struck. Gorsuch (another staunch and Federalist Society from the beginning of his own career) wasn’t enough to truly start shifting things to the Fwad Society’s liking. Kennedy was no liberal but moderate enough to help Robert’s goal of gradual change to make it all seem less radical. Kennedy’s son seems to have had “issues” and that was the leverage. To Kennedy is was a ‘resign and we’ll get Trump to pick Kavanaugh to replace you or we make sure your son goes down.’ So Kennedy quit. If anyone thought there might be a personal issue like health of himself or his wife they’ve been living in quiet, COMFORTABLE obscurity. No, he was forced out.
Now, as with any SCOTUS nominee the FBI does a background investigation. And fellow Federalist Society member (again, from the beginning of his career) Wray just so happened to be in charge of the FBI. Everything that exploded in the hearings was, if the agents had actually done their jobs (and they might well have) was known but not put in the report given to the Senate. But it DID explode. It took some major doing but Wray managed to kill the process that would have ended Kavanaugh’s chances. Wray was willing to damage the FBI’s reputation. So despite some things Wray did Trump didn’t like there was plenty he did to directly help Trump. This Kavanaugh one was a biggie.
As for The Federalist Society, I could write more than one article about what might be going on with them but I’m not at all certain they would take kindly to Wray being fired. They are one of those forces that for all Sen. Whitehouse’s efforts has remained if not in the shadows then at least not with enough light to be clearly seen. They are an entirely different kettle of fish than the Project 2025 folks and far more dangerous to our Constitutional order. Wray will only be 60 or 61 when his stint as FBI Director is up and I’m sure his benefactors have bigger plans for him. Plans which his firing or being forced out early (with the news about this out there everyone knows a resignation would be one of those ‘resign or get fired’ type of things – everyone would know Wray had been fired) would ruin.
Maybe instead of us talking all nicely-nicey to get back the voters we lost because we were elitists, maybe we should take a few pages out of project 2025 and the GQP playbook and win THOSE voters? Assuming there is ever another election?
I don’t think it’s about talking “Nicey-ncey” so much as speaking to people generally, not pegging in groups – speaking to everyone while listening to everyone. It is true that sounding like elitists is a recipe for disaster.
I have always written that you never put the voters down. I think listening to why they voted – not even so much for whom, but why – is the way to begin getting a majority.
jason
Trump is beginning to sound like J.Edgar Hoover on steroids. Hoover went after Dems, civil rights leaders, and those who opposed the Vietnam war. He didn’t go after the mob because he enjoyed gambling on horse races with his partner and they knew it. Trump will.go after everyone he hates because deep.down he knows how incompetent he is.