There’s no denying that the Department of Justice and the FBI are flawed institutions that employ politically partisan individuals. The unprofessional behavior of senior officers can no longer be ignored. The president is right to clean house. It’s a pity that the he is not approaching this issue in a more statesman-like manner. The grave misbehavior of these people is being clouded by Trump’s clumsy and overtly aggressive style.
Let’s begin with the Attorney General, Jeff Sessions. After supporting the Trump administration during the campaign and immediately after being named AG, Sessions recused himself from the ensuing allegations and investigation of Russian and Trump collusion in the 2016 elections. This was a very significant decision because, unlike Sessions, many of the next level management at the DOJ and the FBI are diehard Trump haters. The president was exposed without Session’s involvement.
The result is that the Assistant AG, Rob Rosenstein, appointed a Special Counsel (in Session’s absence) who appears to have no limitations regarding his mission. For the last year, cloaked in secrecy, Robert Mueller has turned Washington upside down without implicating Trump personally.
Also, the Special Counsel will likely have a very serious impact on our midterm elections. We really don’t need to have an interloper make it more complicated for voters to choose their leaders and representatives.
Trump has been critical of Sessions from the outset. He is befuddled why Sessions recused himself, leaving the president at the mercy of partisans in the DOJ. The more important question is why Sessions took the job to begin with, given the nature of the position and his historical relationship with the president.
The writing is on the wall. Sessions is going to be fired soon after the elections, and heaven knows when the Special Counsel will fess up and admit to America he was unable to link Trump to the Russian efforts to destabilize our elections. Even his inane obstruction of justice investigation is crumbling and will likely be dropped.
It was reported in the NY Times that Robert Rosenstein “Raised Idea Of Recording Talks With Trump,” and “[He] Floated and Effort to Remove the President.” Really? Why is this man still in office after treasonously attacking the president?
Rosenstein has flip-flopped on his feelings about James Comey, the former Head of the FBI who was fired by Trump. On the one hand, Rosenstein wrote a memo indicating why Comey should be fired. It had to do with his handling of the Hillary Clinton email scandal. Democrats still attribute Clinton’s defeat in 2016 to Comey’s indecisive behavior to end and then reinvestigate the alleged email activities.
Subsequently Rosenstein regretted writing the memo about Comey and was furious that the president used it as his primary reason for firing the FBI Head.
Just yesterday, the president met with Rosenstein, and it appears that he will not be in office much longer.
Comey is an ambitious man who politicized an organization, the FBI that can only be effective if it steers clear of politics (remember J. Edgar Hoover?). Moreover, Comey regularly disregarded one of the primary foundations of his organization- confidentiality. He was the leaker-in-charge at the FBI. It’s a wonder he has not been indicted for his inappropriate conversations with the press.
And then there’s Comey’s book. It’s chock full of self-aggrandizing tell-all nonsense. A great many people in Washington have criticized Comey’s warped perspective. He certainly was not an FBI Director that America can be proud of.
Other casualties of unprofessional behavior include Andrew McCabe, the former FBI deputy director who was fired in March. He retained memos implicating Rosenstein in an effort to topple the Trump presidency by invoking the 25th Amendment.
Enflaming McCabe’s relationship with Trump was the fact that his wife ran for office in Virginia and was supported by a Democratic PAC affiliated to Hillary Clinton.
And then there are Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, two other high-ranking DOJ employees who were fired for lying and bias against the president that included anti-Trump communications.
Although it’s important for the DOJ and the FBI to have independence and freedom while conducting investigations, it makes no sense for a president to retain individuals who publicly challenge his authority and leadership. There should be no ambiguity that the officers in both organizations are accountable to the president.
Although, once again, Trump’s style makes it seems that these people were treated unfairly, it’s not true. They are partisans who went off the tracks when Trump was elected. For this reason, their termination was warranted.