Tag: investigation
Brian Driscoll

Acting FBI Director Rejects Mass Firing Of Agents Ordered By Trump

President Donald Trump is now aiming to purge the FBI of hundreds of agents who helped investigate him and participants in the January 6, 2021 insurrection. But the man Trump temporarily put in charge of the FBI reportedly isn't going along with his plan.

The Washington Post reported Friday that Trump's proposed mass firings ran into a roadblock in the form of Brian Driscoll, who "refused to endorse the effort," according to the Post's sources. The initiative to identify and fire the agents in question is reportedly being headed by the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the White House, though Trump is apparently distancing himself from the effort.

When asked during a recent Oval Office press gaggle if he ordered the firings, Trump said: "No, but we have some very bad people there... I wasn’t involved in that. But if they want to fire some people, it is fine with me."

Firing FBI agents is a lengthy process, as the bureau allows agents the ability to appeal any termination in two different stages, and entitles them to have a written justification outlining what rules or standards they've been accused of violating. Replacing those agents will also be difficult, as FBI agents have to undergo an intense 18-week training program before being deployed in the field. And any investigations the fired agents were working on will be sidelined until their replacements can be trained and briefed.

Mark Zaid, who is an attorney specializing in federal employment law, told the Post that the proposed mass firings at the FBI — along with his threats to career DOJ prosecutors — could create a legal headache for the Trump administration.

“What this administration is doing is they are acting so recklessly and with disregard to any laws or norms, they are making a ton of errors in order to satisfy their outspoken base that seek retribution,” he said. “And they are creating a lot of legal claims.”

Driscoll's elevation to acting director of the bureau came as a surprise to both Driscoll and Robert Kissane, who was initially tapped for the job. The Wall Street Journal reported that the Trump transition team told Kissane he would be acting director and Driscoll — who reportedly signs his name "Drizz" — would serve as acting deputy director. However, a mixup led to Driscoll being listed on the FBI's website as acting director with Kissane as deputy. Rather than correct the error, the two agreed to swap roles until FBI Director-designate Kash Patel is confirmed by the full Senate.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Alex Jones

Unearthed Video Shows JD Vance Praising Alex Jones For 'Important Truths'

New reporting from ProPublica and Documented revealed that Trump’s vice presidential pick, Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance, praised far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones as a truth teller during a closed-door meeting with the Project 2025 partner organization the Teneo Network in 2021.

Meanwhile, Jones said today that he was in a meeting with Vance “a month ago.”

The Teneo Network, an “invitation-only group of young conservatives” that ProPublica and Documented said Vance joined six years ago, is one of over 100 conservative partner organizations included on the Heritage Foundation’s advisory board for Project 2025. Project 2025 is an extreme right-wing initiative to provide policy and personnel to the next Republican presidential administration.

This post has been updated for clarity.

Vance called Alex Jones a truth teller

In a private speech in 2021 given to the Teneo Network, Vance said that he got backlash when he said that the far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones “is a better source of information than Rachel Maddow, the MSNBC gal,” which he described as a “plainly obvious observation.”

He went on to add that “the most important truths often come from people who are crazy 60 percent of the time but they’re right 40 percent of the time.”


Vance was speaking before the Teneo Network, a Project 2025 partner

The Teneo Network is a right-wing networking group spearheaded by prominent conservative legal activist Leonard Leo. ProPublica and Documented reported on Vance’s speech to the group and what it means for a future Trump second term:

Adding Vance to the ticket bolsters the connections between Leo’s network and the Trump 2024 campaign. It also strengthens ties between Trump’s reelection bid and the Project 2025 blueprint, which outlines plans for a second Trump administration, including firing thousands of career civil servants, shuttering the Department of Education and replacing ambitious goals to combat climate change with ramped-up fossil fuel production. In a recent TV interview, Vance said the document contained “some good ideas” but claimed that “most Americans couldn’t care less about Project 2025” and that the Trump campaign wasn’t affiliated with it."

Jones also claimed he was recently in a meeting with Vance

On his show on July 16, Jones said he was “in a meeting with J.D. Vance a month ago,” calling him “a great guy” and adding that “he's defended me when I was being censored.”

Reprinted with permission from Media Matters.

James Comer

'Political Huckster' Comer Is Exposed In Raucous Contempt Hearing

The fur was flying in a contentious hearing Thursday night as the House Oversight and Investigations Committee passed a resolution to hold Attorney General Merrick Garland in contempt of Congress. Democrats, with some help from GOP Chair James Comer, exposed the purely political motives behind this attack on Merrick and President Joe Biden over the White House’s refusal to turn over audio and video recordings from Biden’s interview with special counsel Robert Hur.

The White House claimed executive privilege on the Hur recordings, with counsel Ed Siskel saying in a letter to Congress that the GOP lawmakers had no legitimate legislative purpose and that their intent in getting the recording was obvious—“to chop them up, distort them, and use them for partisan political purposes.”

Comer proved exactly that Thursday just before the hearing, sending out a fundraising appeal—using his Oversight Committee title—declaring that “Biden and his advisors are terrified that I will release the recordings, forcing the media and Democrats to answer for the dismal decline of Biden’s mental state.”

The top Democrat on the committee, Rep. Jamie Raskin, blasted Comer in his opening statement. “I thought you were serious about the legal enterprise here and not just another political huckster calling hearings to make a buck.”

Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz of Florida provided a must-see “spirited reading” of Comer’s fundraising pitch, after pointing out that the hearing had been delayed so that GOP members could make a pilgrimage to Manhattan to attend Donald Trump’s hush money trial. He noted that the pitch came from “the desk of the Oversight Chairman,” adding “I’m not sure you can do that, but I’m not an ethics expert.”

It was downhill from Republicans after that, largely thanks to the antics of—who else—Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene who threw the process into chaos with a personal attack on Democratic Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Texas, jibing “I think your fake eyelashes are messing up what you’re reading.”

The ensuing fight lasted nearly an hour, with Comer struggling to regain order, and culminated in a vote on whether to allow Greene to continue to participate. It ended in a party-line 22-20 vote, with one exception: Greene’s arch nemesis Rep. Lauren Boebert voted with Democrats to muffle Greene.

To get a sense of how surreal the whole mess was, there’s this: “I just want to apologize to the American people,” Boebert said. “When things get as heated as they have, unfortunately, it’s an embarrassment on our body as a whole.”

The whole debacle, one Democrat suggested, was fueled by the booze certain members consumed before the hearing—and an audience of lawmakers drinking during it. One panel member claimed “we have some members in the room who are drinking inside the hearing room, who are not members of this hearing.”

The crass politics of Comer, the Greene chaos, the partying—it’s all a reflection on just how low the GOP has sunk. It’s also making Speaker Mike Johnson’s job that much harder. Because the hardliners are going to push him to hold a vote on the contempt resolution, and some of the more moderate—and vulnerable—Republicans don’t want to go anywhere near it.

Republican Rep. David Joyce of Illinois is one of them, telling Politico that Congress has “important” work to do “but going after the attorney general isn’t one of them.”

Reprinted with permission from Daily Kos.

Matt Gaetz

'Matt Showed This To Me': Gaetz Allegedly Displayed Nude Pics Of Young Women

Even though the US Department of Justice declined to pursue criminal charges against Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) last year, the House Ethics Committee is still investigating him. And a new profile suggests that investigation may soon intensify.

Earlier this week, The Atlantic's Elaine Godfrey reported that, according to several of her sources, the Florida Republican sent explicit photos and videos of women to some of his colleagues in Congress. One video was allegedly of a young woman hula hooping while naked.

"Matt sent this to me, and you’re missing out," one unnamed Gaetz aide said, telling Godfrey that he watched the video from the back of a fan along with another member of Congress.

According to Godfrey, Gaetz has a longtime habit of "bragging about his sexual conquests" that supposedly includes showing nude photos of women to his friends. One of Gaetz's longtime friends, Erin Scot, recalled a time when she met up with Gaetz at a wedding in 2009 — prior to him launching his political career — and wanted to show him a photo of her girlfriend (Scot came out as lesbian to Gaetz when they were young, and she noted that she felt comfortable with him when he appeared unfazed at the news).

"[Scot] says that later, at the bar, Gaetz passed around an image of his own: a cellphone photo of a recent hookup, staring up topless from his bed," Godfrey wrote.

The far-right congressman allegedly took his public boasting about his hookups to a higher level after being elected to the Florida legislature in 2010. Godfrey wrote that Gaetz and several Republican lawmakers are reported to have devised a "points" system in which participants scored one point for sleeping with a lobbyist, three points for hooking up with a lawmaker and six points for a married legislator. The Washington Post reported in 2021 that Gaetz voted against a Florida bill to criminalize "revenge porn," which involves the sharing of explicit photos without the consent of the subject.

"Gaetz and his friends all played the game, at least three people confirmed to me, although none could tell me exactly where Gaetz stood on the scoreboard. (Gaetz has denied creating, having knowledge of, or participating in the game.)," Godfrey reported.

A source Godfrey described as a "former Republican lawmaker" corroborated other claims about Gaetz's propensity to share unsolicited details about his sex life. That source said Gaetz "used to walk around the cloakroom showing people porno of him and his latest girlfriend.

"He’d show me a video, and I’d say, 'That’s great, Matt.’ Like, what kind of a reaction do you want?" The source said.

And while Gaetz was once a close adviser to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, reportedly being the reason former President Donald Trump endorsed DeSantis' candidacy for his first term in 2018, he has since fallen out of favor with the Sunshine State's governor. Political consultant Peter Schorch told Godfrey that Florida First Lady Casey DeSantis "hated all the sex stories that came out" about Gaetz and that the congressman was to be considered "persona non grata."

The House Ethics Committee's probe into Gaetz is ongoing, and will ultimately product a report that could recommend an official censure motion or even expulsion, as it did with former Rep. George Santos (R-NY). Gaetz continues to deny all of the allegations the committee is investigating.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

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