According to Nicole Parker. a former FBI special agent, those within the FBI who disagree with its seeming politicization and involvement in domestic political matters are scared to call out the agency for its drift away from being America’s premier law enforcement agency because of what it has done to whistleblowers.
She said as much during an appearance on “Mornings with Maria, saying, “You have people that are seeing things that they do not agree with, but they are terrified to speak up, Maria. They are terrified. Look at what they [FBI] did to some of these whistleblowers.”
She then re-emphasized the agency’s alleged targeting of whistleblowers, saying, “if you speak up, they’re going to find just anything on you, and they are going to rip you to shreds — and that’s terrifying to anyone.”
Continuing, Parker said that, instead of punishing whistleblowers for speaking out, the FBI should take their criticisms and look with a critical eye at its past decisions to determine where it might have made critical mistakes. As she said: “Why don’t we humbly, as an agency, the FBI, look back and say, ‘You know what? Maybe we should humbly listen and let’s see, is there something that we could fix?‘”
She then told Maria that the politicization and rot began at the top of the FBI but then spread down throughout the organization, permeating it. In her words: “The trickle-down effect started at the top, and it came all the way down to the field offices.”
And that rot had set in deeply enough that the FBI was ready to target Trump by the 2016 election and Crossfire Hurricane. “The FBI shifted. The trajectory of the FBI, its mission seemed to have stayed the same on paper, but it changed drastically,” she said.
That, in turn, led to a complete distrust of the FBI among people who were paying attention. She said it even made it difficult to recruit sources, as people dealing with her were unwilling to trust the FBI after its politicization came to light and began to be reported upon. She said, “It made it difficult to do my job when I’m trying to recruit sources, for instance, and they don’t even trust me. They’re like, ‘Are you one of the good agents or one of the political agents?‘”
The FBI, in its statement to Fox News about the overall situation and Parker’s allegations, reverted to the usual claims about national security and protecting people, dodging the politicization issue and obliquely insulting whistleblowers.
“The FBI’s mission is to uphold the Constitution and protect the American people,” the statement began, setting up the rest of the national security argument. “In order to accomplish this mission, FBI employees are entrusted with access to sensitive and classified information. Because of the sensitive positions they occupy, FBI employees must demonstrate good judgment, trustworthiness, and reliability by following the law, regulations, and internal policies,” it continued. That is true, as the information is sensitive, but it dodges the issue of when respecting the classified nature of something is less important than calling out a law enforcement’s drift toward being an internal security force that raids the homes of former presidents.
That’s when the FBI statement got to attacking the whistleblowers, characterizing its “targeting,” as Nicole would call it, of them as being “in accordance with” the laws regarding whistleblowers and claiming that it does not target such individuals. It said: “It is a security concern if an employee fails to do so, and as part of our responsibility to protect sensitive national security information the FBI must investigate such failures. The FBI’s security investigations and decision-making are in accordance with the legal authorities and guidelines that all federal agencies are required to follow to objectively determine whether an individual should be eligible to access sensitive and classified information. The FBI has not and will not retaliate against individuals who make protected whistleblower disclosures.“
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