The GOP vs. the FBI
As by-the-book Special Counsel Robert Mueller methodically plumbs the depths of Russian meddling in the 2016 elections, enemies are ratcheting up a desperate smear campaign to portray the ex-FBI director as a political hatchet man. And indiscriminately smearing the reputation of the nation’s top law-enforcement agency to boot.
The President of the United States started it with, what else, a tweet: “After years of Comey . . . running the FBI, its reputation is in Tatters — worst in History! But fear not, we will bring it back to greatness.”
That bewilderingly capitalized fusillade against an executive agency set off a furious week of conservative-media bashing of Mueller and the bureau he and Jim Comey each once led, which has been doing critical legwork for the special counsel.
A Fox News talking head declared that Mueller was packing his team with Obama and Clinton “boosters” in order to “undo a presidential election.” Another called Mueller’s probe a “hyper-partisan attack team” leading a “witch-hunt.” Another suggested the FBI was “just like the old KGB” — without irony, given that Vladimir Putin himself once led the infamous Russian intel agency.
Never mind that Mueller is a lifelong Republican whose judgment has long been considered beyond reproach. In May, Trumpite Newt Gingrich called him a “superb choice” with an “impeccable” reputation for “honesty and integrity.”
Indeed, last summer, Mueller — after discovering anti-Trump texts between two of his investigators — demoted one and allowed the other to transfer. Not enough for Mueller critics.
No man is a saint, and the FBI, like any large agency, is flawed. Comey flubbed the conclusion of the Hillary Clinton investigation — and his kinda sorta reopening of it just before Election Day.
But there was not a peep about political interference from Republicans when Trump surrogate Rudy Giuliani strongly hinted that he was getting anti-Clinton intel directly from the FBI’s New York field office.
The current smear campaign is a transparent attempt to lay the groundwork should Trump someday soon feel the need to remove Mueller. God help us if it comes to that.