How McCarthy’s opposition to a new FBI facility plays into GOP’s plan to wipe out the agency: report

18 July 2023

House Republicans have been criticized by Democratic lawmakers and former Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) staffers after their questioning of FBI Director Christopher Wray during the House Judiciary Committee hearing last week.

Calling the hearing "bizarre," according to The Associated Press, U.S. Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Washington) said, "I didn't think I would ever see Republicans attacking a Republican appointed by Donald Trump to lead the nation’s largest law enforcement agency, essentially saying they want to defund the FBI."

The GOP members who remain "loyal to ex-President Donald Trump were particularly aggressive toward" Wray, "whom they alleged mishandled the criminal probes into Hunter Biden and accused of harboring contempt for conservatives."

Furthermore, AP reports House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-California) recently submitted that "he might stop the FBI from relocating its downtown headquarters to a new facility planned for the Washington suburbs," which more broadly supports his right-wing colleagues' efforts to" eventually dismantle the agency."

"Looking at the actions of the FBI, I think the whole leadership needs to change," McCarthy said last month.

AP reports:

The shifting attitudes among Republican members of Congress toward the FBI underscore the way Trump's personal grievances have become legislative policy. Once the party of law and order, Republicans are now antagonists of federal law enforcement, undermining a storied institution and attacking Justice Department officials whose work is foundational to American democracy.

"This idea that we're going to build a new, big Pentagon and put all the FBI mainly in one place, I don't think it's a good structure," McCarthy said last week, according to the report. "I'd like to see the structure of a much smaller FBI administration building, and more FBI agents out across the country, helping to keep the country safe. To me that's better."

The GOP House members also have support from DC-based right-wing think tank, The Heritage Foundation.

Ex-Trump attorney and current Heritage Foundation senior fellow Steven G. Bradbury penned a "How to Fix the FBI" report "offering nearly a dozen options," according to AP, including "scaling back its jurisdiction," and nixing "section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, known as FISA, that was part of the Trump-Russia investigation over 2016 election interference and is a program some Democrats also want to limit."

Bradbury emphasized, "We have our finger on the pulse of what conservatives are reacting to. The FBI needs to be rebuilt."

The Associated Press' report is available at this link.

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