The FBI-generated indictment of six men on charges of terrorism for planning to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer has all the earmarks of what has become that corrupt agency’s standard operating procedure. Their lawyers are sure to claim they were victims of entrapment. If the case comes to trial, I doubt a jury will convict them.
During the eight years I spent supervising the intelligence agencies for the Senate Intelligence Committee, I watched as what had been a clerisy of strait-laced guardians of truth and justice was becoming a bunch of lazy bureaucrats eager to serve the ruling class’ prejudices.
No longer doing the hard and dangerous work of investigating deeply connected criminals and subversives such as the Mafia and well-financed, politically supported subversives, the FBI limited its vision to politically correct “profiles,” and started chasing small fry. Easy targets, defended by no one. What’s not to like?
After 9/11, the FBI spent few years going after very petty Islamists while covering its collective eyes to the work of major sources of trouble, such as the Muslim Brotherhood, the Palestinian Authority, and Saudi Arabia—each beloved by parts of the ruling class. But before and after this period, these profiles more often than not pointed to the ruling class’ favorite enemy: fellow Americans “excessively concerned with their liberties.”
The FBI’s method? Place agents among the target group, stoke their sentiments, and lead them to say or do something that could be characterized as a crime, then arrest them and claim credit for foiling a plot. In intelligence lingo, that is provocation. In legal terms, it’s entrapment. By whatever name, this is the work of cheap, dirty cops.
In the 1950s, the joke was that any meeting of a Communist Party cell in the New York area was likely to consist of two-thirds infiltrators, half from the FBI and the other half from the New York Police Department. But these FBI infiltrators, like those of the Vietnam era in the 1960s and early ’70s, and like those who penetrated organized crime were merely watching. Doing an honest job. They were not provoking or entrapping, not creating something that would never have been there except for their presence.
Fast forward to our time. The contrast between how the FBI behaves with regard to persons connected to the ruling class and those who are not speaks for itself. The 918 Americans who died in mass suicide in Jonestown Guyana in November 1978 were victims of a cult that had been closely associated with the California Democratic Party. Relatives of the people who were being drawn in had complained to the FBI. But the FBI had refused to keep an eye on the movement, and later officially argued that doing so would have infringed on its political and religious liberties.
And yet when the Tea Party movement arose to protest collusion between the Republican and Democratic parties against popular sentiment on a host of political issues, the FBI rushed to infiltrate it.
Having addressed countless meetings of Tea Parties in Northern California from 2010 to 2012, I experienced this infiltration directly. The audiences were respectful, and asked informative questions. When, occasionally, I got a question that seemed to push me to say something inflammatory, I made it a point to find and speak to the individual who had asked it. Invariably, the person fit a profile with which I had become familiar from my years overseeing the FBI: a man in his late 30s, who had recently moved into the community and worked for a big company, often remotely, and whose echoing of the sentiments surrounding him sounded studied. I would then advise him on how to write his report to headquarters. Generally, the man would walk away.
In the Michigan case, it seems the FBI had started by monitoring the men’s social media traffic and, on the basis of “excess concern for liberty” (prithee, what is that?) had obtained warrants for wiretaps and had inserted one or more infiltrators. But up to this time, no crime could be alleged—only what the FBI and its local affiliate considered a bad attitude.
What exactly was the infiltrator’s role in moving the men from mere talk to incipient, allegedly criminal action? That is going to be the essence of the trial. The FBI will produce recordings made by the infiltrator. When was the device turned on, and when off? To what extent do those intermissions and/or additions made to the recording contribute to the impression that this was a real plot hatched autonomously?
The accused will have the government’s and media’s full weights used against them, as would you or I.
The jury will have to decide whether the FBI was protecting society from sociopaths or whether it is itself sociopathic.
Never talk to the FBI. Have your lawyer do it. And tell him not to say anything. The agency is corrupt to its core. “Defund the FBI.” Reconstruct another agency and place it in Utah away from Washington D.C.
True for all law enforcement. While I love our local police, the reality is that every law enforcement person and every prosecutor is looking for a quick and easy solution to the issue and turning on you is the easiest move since you are the one dumb enough to be talking. Things can easily be taken out of context. Innocent minor errors can later be used to blackmail you with perjury charges (like Flynn). Never talk to law enforcement without your lawyer present.
Re the FBI, at first I thought it was just Comey, Strozk, McCabe, Page and others in the top office working with intelligence hacks like Brennan and Clapper – just upper office corruption in the coup attempt. But then the IG showed that on every single FISA application they reviewed – every one even from myriad regional offices – false data was inserted, exculpatory data was removed, situations were misrepresented – all suggesting a more pervasive issue – either incompetence or corruption. Then we look at Wray – not a part of the central clique of Comey – doing nothing to clean it up, doing nothing to investigate the Biden criminality, going to Congress and making blatantly falsely misleading statements. Came to conclusion that the whole thing is so corrupt as to be beyond redemption. The FBI should be disbanded, the personnel replaced entirely (except maybe for lab and technical staff) and moved far away from the political environment. The FBI should be a law enforcement organization not a political KGB type operation. The new personnel should probably come from unaffected agencies – state organizations, the military, ATF etc. The location should probably be in a smaller state e.g. Kentucky or Missouri or Indiana or Alabama or Michigan – someplace where there is not a culture of big money politics.
The FBI is America’s largest criminal organization!!!!
My sense is the infiltrator played the role of an active provocateur rather than a passive observer. This case reminds me of several 9/11 era busts involving plots to destroy American landmarks by Islamist militants.
Exactly. The Liberty City Seven, for example, were a bunch of cretins who could not get out of their own way. Clearly encouraged to “plot” attacks against prominent landmarks, but not capable of blowing their own noses without help. Other examples abound.
It does. They perfected their entrapment scheme of using some ‘confidential informant’ to convince some dumb Muslim kid to blow something up and get him to go buy some play dough from an FBI agent and then arrest him and get congratulated by both parties and the media for foiling the plot they created. Now they are using this ploy on dumb right wingers. It amazes me anyone is dumb enough to fall for this stuff any more. Any time I see someone advocating for violence online, anywhere, I assume they are a fed or fed plant. I’m sure not all of them are, but some definitely are.
Meanwhile, in cities great and small across America, we have nightly rioting, looting, arson, and murder.
Thank you so much for that fine comment! I am not a conspiracy theory nut. But it seems obvious to me that the FBI and other similar federal agencies have been off the rails for quite sometime. It only grew worse when Trump came down the escalator. So many pundits talk about the rot at the top of such agencies and that the “rank and file 99%” have America’s best interests at heart. I seriously doubt that! Most of them are in it to feather their own nest and CYA. I hope Trump is re-elected and cleans house in his second term. Drain the swamp!
The FBI is America’s largest criminal organization.
But Antifa is just ‘an idea.’ So says Christopher Wray.
Wray does whatever the rabbi tells him to do and say….White Supremacy….yes yes rabbi okay
When the story first broke, Michigan’s Governor Whitmer stated that “Trump is complicit” because of his “hate speech.” Also, our local media inferred that the 6 men were a “militia”, which turns out to be completely untrue. Two of the men were former US Marines. I am not aware of anyone who believes that the FBI infiltrators were passive observers, but that more likely they were instigators. Seems more like an FBI sting than a true investigation of an actual plot to overthrow the Governor.
The
Federal
Bureau of
Matter
is broken for at least one generation.
It is beyond dispute that the FBI is a thoroughly criminal organization. It is useless against crime, will merely throw its hands up when its aid is sought by ordinary victims of crime unless they consider the victim to be a political ally, and is utterly corrupt. Thugs with badges and immunity who now consider their primary role to be protection of their Democrat Party masters. It is well past time to disband the FBI and to try and jail its corrupt leaders (nearly all of them) and thuggish “agents.” Not holding my breath.
Spot on. Fire entire FBI and make them forfeit their pensions and find a job without government benefits. Do we need a Federal Police force? Maybe, but not the 30000 plus of the FBI; try less than 1,000 and their first job is finding out who funds Antifa and BLM. I think we all know it’s Soros but after they destroyed the Koch brothers let’s finally get rid of Soros. Stand up US Marshals in their place but put them in the Dakotas with no DC HQ. They can work on line. Pay and benefits to match those prevailing in the community and a requirement that none can be Ivy League lawyers – though now I am dreaming.
The once mighty FBI has devolved into a tool of the Political Class. Today, under Comey and now Christopher Wray, they have become a criminal enterprise as they align themselves with the Communist Demo☭rats. The very Communists they investigated during the 1950’s, they have aligned themselves with today.
The arrest of the Six Whitmer Clowns was political theater, coordinated through George Śorøś’ network. BLM supporters going after one of BLM’s greatest allies in Whitmer? No. It is yet another narrative that was supposed to read “White Supremacists attempt to kidnap a Demo☭rat Governor.” Unfortunate for the stupid FBI, Conservatives unraveled the players in their little drama far more quickly than they anticipated. Christopher Wray himself stated that the FBI was chasing the boogieman White Supremacist while ignoring the Śorøś network of violent thugs. It could not be more obvious.
For Communists, there are no ethical barriers. The ends always justify their means. According to court records in the Flynn trial, we now see the FBI adopting the Communist manta, fabricating evidence to create a desired outcome.
Odd how every evil person never believes that justice will catch up with them someday. Karma has a way of balancing injustices out. We need to hold the Presidency and the Senate at all costs if we have any hope of reforming the corrupt FBI.
The FBI is an enemy to the people. They probably carry water for the pedophists they actively protect.
I blame Boomers and their civ-nat BS.
Last year I wrote an article for a faith publication about the FBI terror arrest of a young man in Las Vegas against a Messianic synagogue. I began to gather my research from open sources in news articles and press releases from the Anti-Defamation League who claimed their Center on Extremism had been tracking and interacting with Conor Climo for a couple of years prior to arrest.
In fact, I did also find the instance two years earlier that put Climo on the ADL’s CoE radar. It was published in a local media column written by Pesach “Pace” Lattin who saw a news report about Climo doing a neighborhood patrol. Lattin said he did research on Climo and found YouTube rants about illegal aliens, gays and blacks. Lattin claims to be a “hacker” who worked for the Treasury Dept Secret Service as a Special Investigator for the New York Electronic Crimes Task Force. Lattin is likely a member of the ADL’s CoE, and at the very least the original source for their social media trackers to begin watching him online.
At that time there is absolutely NO mention of Conor Climo hating Jews. So when did this hatred develop, and was it as a result of manipulation by the social media trackers who were interacting with him?
Because of other things I found in researching this story, for example how the FBI failed to identify the Messianic congregation targeted to the news media. It was only uncovered by a local crime reporter and when she reported the target, the ADL withdrew their ‘alarm’ over an antisemitic terror plot saying that no Jews were every in jeopardy from Conor Climo’s scheme. What that means is they disavow that Messianic believers are Jews. It is a denial of their faith in Jesus, rather than a denial of the antisemitic threat they were touting with full knowledge that it was the Messianic synagogue Climo was targeting. I honestly would not be surprised if the ADL’s CoE asked the FBI not to reveal with synagogue had been targeted.
Other issues I found suspicious, after Climo was arrested, which was on the heels of the El Paso mall shooting and the Dayton, Oh attack, three were something in the neighborhood of 22 preemptive domestic terrorist arrests made. This might make us feel like the FBI was on top of it, and it would if I had not run into several news articles talking about how Trump had made many enemies in certain ranks of the FBI and Homeland Security with his focus on illegal alien crimes. There appears to me to be a ‘deep state’ divide in those law enforcement organizations that deserves scrutiny and for sure accountability must be brought to the online interactions of social media trackers with those they are targeting.
This didn’t just being with the Trump presidency. Pamela Geller had suspicions about how the FBI and their social media trackers had conducted themselves with the terrorists who attempted to attack her at a Garland, Texas event. Even though the FBI person interacting with the two terrorists was at the Garland event facility watching, there were no FBI there to stop the attack and Garland police were only given 2 hours prior alert that an attack would be attempted. Why? Geller also questioned the text the FBI undercover agent sent the attackers, “Tear up Texas.”
As Geller wrote, “While I do believe that undercover FBI agents have to play along with the jihadis they’re dealing with, because in order to be in an informant you have to have credibility, it’s a whole other thing if you’re encouraging and cheering on the proposed murder of Americans who are standing in defense of the freedom of speech, and then not doing anything about it. . . .Did the Obama FBI want us dead? We need answers: we need an explanation of the FBI’s behavior that accounts for everything we know and demonstrates that this is not the case – if there is one.”
It seems to me it comes down to the same ancient question: ” Who will watch the watchers?”
”Who will watch the watchers?”
Eventually, it will be Leupold, Nikon, Nightforce, U.S. Optics, Steiner, Zeiss. The watchers, apparently, wouldn’t have it any other way.
What I see is Gov. Gretchen Whitmer kidnapping a whole State populace!
I see self-defense!
The FBI should be abolished and replaced with a true, unarmed investigative agency.
What I want to know but can’t find out in any media source is there is the laptop that the FBI picked up last December. Who picked it up and what did they do with it? Why is nobody asking?
What I want to know but can’t find out in any media source is where is the laptop that the FBI picked up last December. Who picked it up and what did they do with it? Why is nobody asking?
Where is the Washerwomen lap top, the Weiner lap top? Where is the interview of Azra Turk, Halper, Misfud, the Russian lawyer who tried to ambush Eric Trump? Where is the infiltration of Antifa and BLM? How about who assaulted Tucker Carson, Rand Paul? How about if the Chinese brought in the virus as an act of war or sabotage? Plenty of questions and the FBI can only write fiction.
Mr. Codevilla, the people are ahead of you in this matter. Before you put pen to ink, many had come to the conclusions you have stated so eloquently. Your thoughts and the facts you bring to light, widely distributed, are much appreciated.
We are at the black cars in the night disappearing political opponents phase of tyranny.
All I know is it’s President Trumps fault. /sarc
The FBI like other agencies in the national security apparatus have assumed the role of “Praetorian Guard.” They want to be “veto players” if not “king makers” in public policymaking and the general development of society. Codevilla is spot-on. While I have never met Stryok, Page, McCabe, Baker, Clinesmith, etc., I feel like I know them because they frighteningly represent everyone I have known in the FBI–pathologically insecure, extremely arrogant, playing fast and loose with ethics and the law. They are not Boy Scouts or the “White Hats.” Historically, I am not surprised by this behavior as a lifelong student of history and politics. What enrages me is that as a conservative, Christian, and lifelong Republican is that we have no real adult supervision from our representatives. Republicans are facilitators for all of this!
Is it possible that the governor herself was part of the entrapment?
Of course it’s sociopathic. Government ignores its own laws. Governors ignore court rulings they don’t like. Citizens are left with no recourse but to take matters into their own hands, just like the Founding Fathers did, but THAT’S what gets prosecuted. Law enforcement exists to protect the privileged in office, that’s it. It’s a racket, and America is done for since no one will stand up to it.
What we are witnessing is what the founding fathers described as “absolute despotism”.
They did Declare us a constitutional prescription for that.
Since the swamprat bureaucrats in dc can no longer be trusted to investigate themselves, I suggest that common law grand juries are the answer.
Here’s how they work ????
https://www.1215.org/lawnotes/lawnotes/grandjuryrules.htm
Beats the hell out of a civil war.
When Mueller was put in charge 19 years ago the FBI stopped protecting America and started protecting our “elite”! FBI still looks out for “our betters” at our expense!
knowing what we know about them, I can’t see how any juror could convict someone of jaywalking based on fbi testimony
This is of course why the likes of Wray are still covering up their Russiagate activities. It was ALL entrapment. And this is their SOP. OK, it’s not entirely new, but I agree, it seems much more pervasive now.
Does the FBI use this successfully to take down truly dangerous enemies? I have no idea. Does the FBI want the public to know this is their SOP? No, they don’t. Is it generally legal? Will it usually hold up on court? SHOULD it hold up in court? Does the FBI have any choice or is this pretty much what they *must* do? I suppose these are all good discussions. Until Wray and his ilk make it all look filthy.
The FBI has been corrupt from the start. It should be disbanded and the ground where it’s headquarters stands sown with salt. The same with all Federal law enforcement agencies other than Customs, the Border Patrol, and the counterfeiting division of the Secret Service.
After watching the FBI play the key role in the attempted Deep State coup against Trump and understanding as the data emerged, that the whole thing was a put-up scheme by the Clinton organization with support from Obama, Biden, Brennan, and Clappers but the heavy lifting done by the FBI and their support to the corrupt DOJ and the fake Mueller organization. . . . can anyone watching this circus have any thought other than that the DOJ and FBI are deeply corrupt organizations? Then the data came out that not only did theylie to the FISA courts on this, they misused compromised data to get wrong search warrants on every case the Inspector General investigated (many) – so it was not a few bad apples it is the norm. And then knowing that the head of the FBI has done nothing to expose the problem or prevent it and instead is doing all he can to distract people from the flaws of the organization, my conclusion is that the whole organization is corrupted, politicized and needs to be replaced. The fact that they do nothing about AntiFa who repeatedly killed Trump supporters, committed widespread arson, blinded police with lasers, fired industrial strength fireworks to burn police and threw Molotov cocktails as they looted and destroyed hundreds of businesses and instead try to focus on a few clown revolutionary wannabees using an agent provocateur – all in all it is pretty obvious that since we need an organization like the FBI but since the current FBI is corrupt and useless, the whole organization needs to be disbanded and replaced by a new organization with a totally different leadership and staffing. Ditto for the DOJ.
THis is a sad conclusion re a once great organization. But it is corrupt from root to branch and shows no signs of being able to fix itself. J Edgar Hoover may have had his issues, but he would never have let this happen.
But the FBI needs to be disbanded and all the agents fired. Not rolled into some new super crap agency like DHS. Terminated.
The FBI is evolving into State Security (SS for short). Seig Heil.
Of course they will. The fbi is a rogue organization of the deep state fifth column communists and SJWs masquerading as law enforcement protecting and defending the subversion of the USA.
Eventually it is going to be a full on communist tool to transforn into the USA version of the NKVD or the stasi. Absolutely corrupt and illegitimate organization.
It is what it is.
The fbi and most leo have been playing for team antifa and blm folks
Why these marxist orgs are being defended who literally burn loot and murder in the cities the fbi is obviously buying them cover.
This is the same FBI who has Weiner’s laptop, which the contents of are supposedly very horrific…an FBI agent took notes and the fourth point was sited as : 4) Crimes against children…..The rumor is Hillary and Huma skinned a girls face off, the file was stored in a folder named “Insurance” But years late and NOTHING
Just like the FBI had Hunter Biden’s laptop and ????? NOTHING
The FBI will sent 5-6 agents to investigate a so called “hate” crime against Bubba Wallace because it involves the big bad “bogey” man ….white supremacy…
It looks like the ADL and SPLC with their anti White anti American Anti Christian hatred have infiltrated the FBI….America…the talmudic supremacists are plotting your destruction and especially you White man
The FBI is complicit in this and supports it….are there any free thinking members of the FBI who are Pro American or do they all bent over and take it for the talmudic rabbi?
When I entered law enforcement in the early ’70’s, one of our Academy instructors told us, “The FBI never just stops by for coffee. They are always there for a reason” . Just like with news reporters, there is no such thing as “off the record”. Everything is always on the record and looking for a ‘gotcha’., so watch what you say. Don’t kid yourself. They are not your friends and never will be. There is always an agenda. Always.
I know Mr. Codevilla. He knows of what he speaks.
A long time ago I used to think that if someone was under investigation by the fbi they must have done something wrong.
They have a looooong history of doing this, it is their PRIMARY mission. Ruby Ridge, Oklahoma, Waco,Boston,etc,etc. They come up with the idea, provide the logistics and the means and then bust the poor souls, who were unlucky enough to fall for the entrapment.
Here are some old articles about how they do it:
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/how-fbi-entrapment-is-inventing-terrorists-and-letting-bad-guys-off-the-hook-244905/
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/peteraldhous/fbi-entrapment
For decades, the left derided the FBI as a federal gestapo anxious the orchestrated martial law, death squads or kangaroo courts. It was never true; it was just the predictable attack of leftists and anarchists.
Well now it is a little true – with spying on campaigns, framing targets, tampering with evidence. But, whaddyaknow, its those very leftists and their enablers that have created it.
Fear the left. The worst crimes in history emerge from their world view and zeal.
Ball Barr is just as bad if not worse….I guess cut from the same cloth. Who defended (wouldn’t recommend charges against) the FBI sniper (Lon Horiuchi)
who murdered Vicki Jean Weaver at Ruby Ridge? You got it, Billy Bush Barr.
The FBI under Hoover insisted for DECADES “Organized Crime” was a myth while they used Teamster Pension Funds to “Buy” Vegas and intervene in Presidential politics in 1960. In my 62 years it’s been one long agonizing trainwreck. EVERY 5-6 years it’s been some fresh hell of a scandal which we’re always assured is some one off accident of excess zeal or inexplicable over sight; think Waco or 9-11.
Anyone recall the FBI crime lab scandal a few years ago? Something like 70% of lab results were claimed falsified. I think their main goal has been directed (in)justice for hire for some time now.
How about let’s start with firing C. Wray and every other top career FBI guy and gal, especially every single one who came into the bureau under Mueller or Comey, or was part of the Barry and Joe team. Then appoint a Bill Barr vetted outsider to head up the reform. The head of the snake must go first, then we can “see what happens.”