Tulsi Gabbard Providing FBI Oversight Isn’t ‘Dangerous To Our Democracy’
Every so often there’s a piece of content in The New York Times or a similar publication that’s meant to create suspicion but without saying exactly why, usually for the purpose of politicizing something mundane. The story this week about National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard being on site during an FBI operation in Atlanta is one of those pieces of content, but in this case, the reason for the manufactured suspicion is obvious.
The Times on Monday wrote that it was “unusual” for Gabbard to appear at an FBI field office following the agency’s seizure of 2020 ballots from an election center in the ever-so-seedy Fulton County. You know, the place where election officials just admitted to improperly certifying hundreds of thousands of ballots in violation of the election rules. “[H]er continued presence has raised eyebrows given that her role overseeing the nation’s intelligence agencies does not include on-site involvement in criminal investigative work,” the article, reported by a grand total of three people, said.
Gabbard was there, at least in part, to facilitate a call between President Trump and the field agents, the story said. That call was characterized by unnamed sources in the article as “a pep rally or a coach giving an encouraging halftime speech to his players,” but only after the Times has assured readers how “unusual” and “outside the bounds of normal law enforcement procedure” all of this is.
For good measure, the Times quoted a former “senior Justice Department official” to characterize the episode as “extremely dangerous to our democracy and a shocking abandonment of years of sound policy …” I don’t know if I’ll ever have another night of peace knowing what I know now.
To the extent that anything is “unusual” or “a shocking abandonment of years of sound policy,” it’s that this president takes a direct interest in attempts by his political opposition to sabotage his victories and thwart his agenda — the thing voters elected him to enact. That often means being physically present himself or deputizing someone he trusts to be there for him.
Everyone at the Times knows there’s nothing scandalous about Trump directing his head of national intelligence to either supervise or witness an investigation or law enforcement operation. Believe it or not, the Times doesn’t get to determine what is or isn’t in the purview of a cabinet secretary selected by the president of the United States — even if it’s a “shocking abandonment of years of sound policy,” which is another way of Democrats saying, “contrary to what’s in our favor.”
What’s in Democrats’ favor is for unelected bureaucrats and like-minded “career” law enforcement agents to conduct their business with no oversight or accountability. That way they can do exactly what Democrats want, without ever being told by any type of leadership, because they already know what that is.
I say that everyone at the Times already knows this is because it was the paper that published the infamous “anonymous” op-ed in 2018 explaining exactly that. “[M]any of the senior officials in his own administration are working diligently from within to frustrate parts of his agenda and his worst inclinations,” wrote the author, who has since revealed himself to be the rodent-like Miles Taylor, a Department of Homeland Security official during Trump’s first term. “I would know. I am one of them.”
As for the FBI, there’s no need to rehash all the ways that agency has lied to courts and perhaps even planted evidence for the sake of ensnaring Trump, all of which earned the agency a recent pep talk phone call in Atlanta. (“Extremely dangerous to our democracy.”)
The issue is not that Tulsi Gabbard is somehow barred from participating in whatever the president says she should be involved in. It’s that Democrats and the dying media that protect Democrat interests don’t want her to be involved. Having her provide oversight complicates their plans to continue opposing Trump from within his own administration. That’s too bad.
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