Fox News parrots Donald Trump's FBI search talking points
Former President Donald Trump's announcement on Monday that the Federal Bureau of Investigation executed a search warrant at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida has enraged Republicans across the country. Right-wing lawmakers, media pundits, and Trump supporters are terrified that the United States Department of Justice was searching an ex-president's residence harbingers a government crackdown on conservatives.
On Tuesday morning, Fox News host Harris Faulker parroted this visceral reaction, claiming that the Internal Revenue Service will begin targeting average Americans based on their political views.
"I think big picture with these things. I mean, if this can happen to a former president of the United States – and they've just hired through this monster spending bill 87,000 IRS agents to come after the rest of us – I mean, what could this look like for the American people? So on a bigger scale, I look at this and why we need to hear from the DOJ immediately," Faulkner said.
READ MORE: 'Un-American': GOP lawmakers lash out after FBI raids Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate
Trump lobbed almost identical complaints in his Monday evening Truth Social missive.
That argument is rooted in the $79.6 billion in funding for the IRS over the next decade that was allocated in the Inflation Reduction Act, which the Senate passed on Sunday and is currently being reviewed by the House of Representatives.
CNBC explained on Monday that "more than half of the money is meant for enforcement, with the IRS aiming to collect more from corporate and high-net-worth tax dodgers. The remainder of the funding is earmarked for operations, taxpayer services, technology, development of a direct free e-file system and more. Collectively, those improvements are projected to bring in $203.7 billion in revenue from 2022 to 2031, according to recent estimates from the Congressional Budget Office."
The legislation also authorized expanding the IRS workforce by 86,852 to tackle the aforementioned challenges.
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But the "raid," as Trump called it, was not politically motivated. News broke late Monday night that the Justice Department is investigating the trove of classified documents that Trump and his associates removed from the White House after he left office.
Watch below or at this link.
\u201cHarris Faulkner's Fox News show today is literally MAGA propaganda. It's like Trump dictated everything she's saying.\u201d— Aaron Rupar (@Aaron Rupar) 1660057669
