In another sign of the FBI’s shift into blatant partisanship, federal agents who publicly knelt before Black Lives Matter rioters in Washington D.C. were subsequently given monetary rewards for their actions.
According to the Post Millennial, the multiple agents from the D.C. field office who could be seen kneeling before rioters on June 4th, 2022, were each given $100 gift cards by the FBI Agents Association (FBIAA). This was reported by retired FBI Supervisory Special Agent James Gagliano, who wrote in the New York Post that this revelation was “shocking and appalling on its face.”
“Looked at in a larger context,” Gagliano continued, “this disgusting decision proves the rot and decay at the FBI is not singularly the domain of some senior officials.”
The incident involved a team of armed agents wearing FBI vests, who had been designed as a “presence patrol” to guard the National Archives and Supreme Court as riots raged across D.C., with many buildings being set on fire by the rioters.
When rioters noticed the FBI agents and began reacting with hostility, at least seven of the agents took a knee – a gesture that has come to be recognized as an act of disrespect towards the United States, which has been used most often by black nationalists. In addition, a senior counterterrorism special agent hugged some of the rioters. FBI management defended this display as an act of “de-escalation,” and thus rewarded every agent with gift cards of “modest value.”
“During my 25-year career, I was privileged and honored to work alongside FBI agents who killed or captured Top Ten fugitives and violent, dangerous, murderous felons,” Gagliano wrote. “To my knowledge, not one of these actual heroes received an FBIAA gift card of ‘modest value.’”
“I have come to grips with the fact that my beloved FBI has been irreparably broken by woke activists serving amongst its senior ranks,” the former special agent added. “And with the Justice Department appearing to do this president’s bidding by targeting his political adversaries, it will take a monumental house-cleaning and seismic shift in culture at both the DOJ and the FBI to begin to restore America’s trust and confidence.”
Federal law enforcement has been widely criticized for its failure to crack down on the race riots that took place across the country in the summer of 2020. The riots, led by the far-left domestic terrorist groups Black Lives Matter and Antifa, were in response to the death of George Floyd, a black man who died of a fentanyl overdose while in police custody in Minneapolis, whose death was falsely blamed on the arresting officers. The riots resulted in the destruction of dozens of cities and hundreds of businesses, caused over $2 billion in damages, and led to the deaths of at least 30 civilians who were killed by rioters.