Will Trump Use The FBI To Arrest Texas State House Democrats?

 

Donald Trump's agenda is not popular with most Americans. That has him worried that Republicans could lose the House of Representatives in the 2026 election. If Republicans lose the House, Democrats might then be able to block the worst of Trump's unpopular actions.

A reasonable chief executive would probably change his unpopular agenda, but Trump is not a reasonable person. He doesn't care what the public wants as long as he can get what he wants. To accomplish this he has decided to cheat to retain the House in 2026. He has instructed Texas Republicans to redraw the states' U.S. House districts to get Republicans an additional five seats. To do this, they would likely be destroying some minority districts by placing many minorities in heavily Republican districts.

Democrats don't have enough members of the state legislature to stop the new Republican gerrymandering. But they have the power to stop it by refusing to show up for the votes by denying a quorum in the Texas House. The House cannot pass any law (including redistricting) unless a quorum of 100 members is present. 

Enough Democrats have left the state (going to Democratic states) to deny the Republicans a quorum. The House speaker has issued a civil order for the arrest and return of the Democrats, and Gov. Abbott has instructed state DPS troopers to do that. But those troopers don't have jurisdiction outside of Texas, and since the Democratic House members have not broken any criminal law, the Democratic states and cities they have gone to are refusing to aid in their arrest. It is currently a stand-off.

Texas Senator John Cornyn has asked the FBI to assist in locating and arresting the missing Texas Democrats. And Donald Trump has said that might have to be done.

But the mission of the FBI is to "protect the American people and uphold the Constitution of the United States". They should not be used to help either political party in a partisan political matter (which this is). The Texas House Democrats may have angered Trump and Texas Republicans, but they have not broken any laws - either state or federal.

If Trump orders the FBI to intervene, his lackey Kash Patel would probably cooperate. That would turn the FBI into an enforcement branch of the Republican Party - an inappropriate and possibly illegal use of the FBI. It should never be used in a purely partisan political manner for either political party.

If Trump does this, it will mean he can use the most powerful law enforcement agency in America as his personal political retribution arm. That would be a giant step toward the dissolution of our democracy. 

Very Few Think Trump's DOJ/FBI Will Be Neutral

The chart above is from an AP/NORC Poll -- done between January 9th and 13th of a nationwide sample of 1,147 adults, with a 3.9 point margin of error.
 

Five Things To Know About Kash Patel

The New York Times gives us 5 things we should know about Kash Patel - Trump's pick to head the FBI.

Here are five takeaways from a recent New York Times profile of Mr. Patel.

Former colleagues question his qualifications.

Mr. Trump said in his social media post announcing his choice for the F.B.I. that Mr. Patel had “tried over 60 jury trials.” Colleagues from Mr. Patel’s time as an entry-level public defender in Florida recall him as a middling performer with a deep animosity toward the Justice Department prosecutors he found himself up against. His former supervisor, Michael Caruso, a federal public defender who led the Southern District of Florida office at the time, said that Mr. Patel shied away from filing motions that he was likely to lose.

Mr. Patel spent about three years as a terrorism prosecutor at the Justice Department. He has repeatedly claimed he was the “lead prosecutor” in the government’s pursuit of the perpetrators of the 2012 attack on a U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya, that killed four Americans. In fact, Mr. Patel was a junior Justice Department staff member at the time, and he was not part of the trial team.

He is the author of the ‘Nunes Memo.’

Mr. Trump ordered that Mr. Patel be given a job on the National Security Council staff after Mr. Patel, then a House Intelligence Committee staffer, impressed Mr. Trump as the primary author of what has come to be called the secret “Nunes memo.” The document was a key element in the effort of House Republicans to undermine the Justice Department’s investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 election.

Mr. Patel’s memo, which Mr. Trump declassified over the objections of the intelligence agencies and Democrats, fueled bogus claims by Mr. Trump, Republicans and conservative media that politics drove the Russia investigation and that the government had spied on the Trump campaign itself.

He was a would-be ‘political executioner.’

In 2019, as President Trump battled public outrage and a looming impeachment over his effort to enlist Ukraine in digging up dirt on former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., he proposed to a group of top advisers that Mr. Patel, a backbench staffer on the National Security Council, begin vetting White House aides for loyalty. He would have served as a “political executioner,” in the words of Charles Kupperman, the deputy national security adviser at the time. Mr. Kupperman and White House legal advisers talked the president out of it, saying it would create legal and morale problems.

He says his nonprofit helps Jan. 6 defendants.

The Kash Foundation is a nonprofit that Mr. Patel has said offers financial help to a range of recipients, including the families of people charged for their roles in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. Tax filings for 2023 show the foundation’s revenue surged from $182,000 in 2022 to $1.3 million last year. Its expenses rose fivefold over 2022 to $674,000. Almost half of that was spent on promotion and advertising, an expense that totaled more than the foundation gave away in contributions and grants last year.

He sells pro-Trump merchandise under the logo K$H.

Since the end of the Trump administration, Mr. Patel has parlayed his association with the former president into enterprises he promotes under the logo “K$H.” He sells pro-Trump T-shirts and other items as well as a series of his children’s books that pay homage to “King Donald.” Mr. Patel also collected hundreds of thousands of dollars in consulting fees from the 2024 Trump campaign and from Friends of Matt Gaetz, the campaign committee for the former House Republican from Florida, who withdrew from consideration as Mr. Trump’s attorney general after criticism over allegations of sex trafficking and drug use.

FBI Data Shows Trump Is Lying About Crime In The U.S.

 

From the FBI crime report.

34% Of The GOP Say The FBI Instigated The January 6th Riot

 

The chart above is from the Washington Post / University of Maryland Poll -- done between December 14th and 18th of a nationwide sample of 1,024 adults, with a 4.1 point margin of error.

Thousands Of Police Dept. Don't Report Hate Data To FBI

 

The following is by the editorial board of The Washington Post:

The FBI released what seemed to be good news earlier this month, announcing that the agency had counted 7,262 instances of hate crimes in 2021 — a drop from 8,263 the year before. In fact, outside experts said, hate crimes might actually have trended sharply higher last year; the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism charted a 21 percent surge in hate crimes in 20 states over the same period. One reason for the discrepancy: The FBI relies on state and local police departments to report crime numbers to the federal government, and only 11,883 of 18,812 law enforcement agencies submitted their 2021 hate-crimes data. The nation’s two largest cities, New York and Los Angeles, were among the non-reporters.

FBI crime data is supposed to give the public, criminal justice researchers and law enforcement agents hard numbers so that they have more than just instinct and anecdote — and the claims of demagogic politicians — to characterize what is happening on the country’s streets and elsewhere. Real numbers provide insights into what is working and what is not. They also show how often police respond to crime with force, against what types of people and in what situations. But voluntary compliance from state and local departments falls well short of what is necessary.

This is not the first time the FBI has struggled to collect reliable criminal justice statistics. The Post has tracked fatal police shootings since 2015, painstakingly sorting through news and social media reports, local law enforcement records and other sources. The Post has found that police shoot and kill about 1,000 people every year — including 1,084 over the past 12 months. Black Americans are killed at a much higher rate than White Americans, the victims skew young, and nearly all are male. Further, the number of fatal police shootings has been rising in recent years, The Post’s tally shows. Yet the FBI has reported a decline between 2015 and 2021. The FBI’s records contain only about one-third of the 7,000 fatal police shootings The Post counted during that period.

In other words, the statistics provided voluntarily by local law enforcement agencies underplay both the scale of the problem and the urgency of taking measures to address it — for instance, by updating use-of-force guidelines and investing in de-escalation training. The FBI has embarked on a broad effort to track fatalities and serious bodily injury committed by law enforcement officers, plus instances in which police officers fire their weapons. Yet the bureau  almost had to shut down the program for lack of response from local police departments.

All of this is despite Congress having passed laws in 1994 and 2014 to improve federal crime data collection.

True, in any given year, smaller police departments might have seen no hate crimes, police use-of-force incidents or other notable events to report, so they might not see a need to inform the FBI. Doing so takes time and resources; the FBI estimates it consumes 38 minutes to report every incident to its police use-of-force database. Police departments complain that the FBI’s transition to a new crime reporting system, which asks for more details, has made complying harder.

But “none this year” results are crucial if the FBI is to compile an accurate and comprehensive report. Police departments that have a sense of what is happening within their areas would also benefit from seeing what is happening down the road — or across the country.

Congress should intervene once again. Federal appropriations to help police departments report their crime numbers are an obvious place to start. At the same time, Congress should condition the large number of various crime-fighting grants it sends to state and local governments on departments reporting their numbers. Bills such as 2021’s George Floyd Justice and Policing Act, which passed the House but got nowhere in the Senate, would have created such a system. Federal legislators should also eliminate any confusing or duplicative reporting requirements that place an unnecessary burden on police departments.

Ultimately, however, the federal government has only so much leverage. Most police funding comes from state and local governments. Some departments get scant federal money at all. So state governments should also step in, requiring their police departments to submit crime data to the FBI — or to them directly, to be forwarded to the FBI.

A trustworthy set of statistics is a foundational tool with which to begin figuring out just how big of a problem crime, police use of force and related issues are in the United States — and how to tackle them.

Trump Says Mar-A-Lago Search Was Like Watergate

On Monday, the FBI conducted a day-long search of Mar-A-Lago. Predictably, Donald Trump blew a fuse! He claimed it was unnecessary and politically motivated. He even went so far as to compare the search of his Florida home to the break-in at the Watergate Building -- asking, "What's the difference between this and Watergate?"

Of course, there is a huge difference. The burglary of the Watergate Building was a crime. The search of Mar-A-Lago was not. The search was a legal action done with a warrant (approved by the head of the FBI and signed by a federal judge). The warrant would not have been issued unless the judge was convinced there was credible evidence of a crime and information regarding that crime was contained in Mar-A-Lago (and could be destroyed if the search was not conducted).

Here is what former Labor Secretary Robert Reich wrote about the search:

“Nothing like this has ever happened to a President of the United States before,” Donald Trump raged today after FBI agents searched his Mar-a-Lago home in Palm Beach, Florida and broke open a safe, apparently looking for documents that Trump illegally took from the White House.  

To set the record straight. Trump is no longer president of the United States. He’s a normal citizen. He may believe he’s still president because he never conceded the 2020 election, but he lost that election. As a result, he is subject to the same search-and-seizure provisions, under court supervision, as is anyone else. 

Trump may be correct that no former president has ever before been subject to an FBI search, but, then again, nothing like Trump has ever before happened to the United States. No former president has ever attempted a coup to remain in office.

Trump claims that the search of Mar-a-Lago was intended to stop him from running for president in 2024. 

There is no way the search could stop him from running, unless, perhaps, the search turns up even more evidence that he participated in an “insurrection or rebellion” against the United States – in which case, pursuant to Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment, Congress might move to disqualify him from running. But it’s far from clear that even such a congressional resolution would trigger Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment. 

On the other hand, if a grand jury determines that Trump broke the law and decides to indict him, the Justice Department could take him to court, where a jury could decide he is guilty. The court conceivably could send him to prison. This would make it difficult, although not impossible, for him to run for or be re-elected president. 

We don’t know yet what the FBI agents who searched Trump’s home in Mar-a-Lago today were looking for, but in January, the National Archives and Records Administration retrieved 15 boxes of documents from Mar-a-Lago that National Archives officials said should have been turned over when Trump left the White House. Evidently, more boxes were missing. 

We also know that a federal grand jury in Washington has been gathering information about efforts by Trump, along with his lawyers and enablers, to try to use fake electors to block Joe Biden from formally becoming president after the 2020 election. As part of that investigation, authorities have begun examining Trump’s actions, seeking to discover what instructions he gave to subordinates, according to people familiar with the investigation.

In today’s statement, Trump claimed that “such an assault could only take place in broken, Third-World Countries.” If he was referring to the assault he instigated on January 6, 2021, against the United States Capitol, he is partly correct. Had that assault been successful, the United States could indeed have become a broken, Third-World country.

Today’s search of his home, however, was done with a warrant and approved by a court. It occurred under the law.

But America might still become a broken, Third-World country, due to Trump’s and other Republicans’ continuing efforts to sow doubt on the outcome of the 2020 election. During a speech on Saturday at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Dallas, Trump reiterated his claim that the 2020 election “was rigged and stolen and now our country is being systematically destroyed,” despite the fact that sixty federal judges, some appointed by Trump, concluded that the election was not rigged and stolen and that Trump’s own Department of Justice came to the same conclusion. Trump, however, has systematically tried to destroy our country. 

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban spoke at that same conference last Saturday. Orban has turned Hungary into a Third-World autocracy. This is what Trump wants for the United States. He and his Republican enablers are still at it. 

We have only one bulwark against this menace. It is called the rule of law. Finally, it seems, on the basis of today’s search of Mar-a-Lago, that bulwark is being utilized.

The Updated FBI Hate Crime Statistics For 2020

The FBI has updated its hate crime statistics for 2020, and they released the results on October 25th.

Here is that release:

Today the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program released amended 2020 hate crime statistics about bias-motivated incidents throughout the nation. Hate crime statistics for 2020 were originally released in August 2021. Due to a technical issue with submission, only partial Ohio data for 2020 were released. For that reason, modifications were made to Ohio’s hate crime data in the FBI’s database following the release. In turn, these updates affected the national hate crime totals. The updated 2020 data, submitted by 15,138 law enforcement agencies, provide information about the offenses, victims, offenders, and locations of hate crimes.

Law enforcement agencies submitted incident reports involving 8,263 criminal incidents and 11,129 related offenses as being motivated by bias toward race, ethnicity, ancestry, religion, sexual orientation, disability, gender, and gender identity. Highlights of Hate Crime Statistics, 2020, follow. (Due to rounding, percentage breakdowns may not add to 100%.)

Victims of Hate Crime Incidents

• There were 8,052 single-bias incidents involving 11,126 victims. A percent distribution of victims by bias type shows that 61.8% of victims were targeted because of the offenders’ race/ethnicity/ancestry bias, 20.0% were victimized because of the offenders’ sexual-orientation bias, 13.3% were targeted because of the offenders’ religious bias, 2.7% were targeted because of the offenders’ gender identity bias, 1.4% were victimized because of the offenders’ disability bias, and 0.7% were victimized because of the offenders’ gender bias.
• There were 211 multiple-bias hate crime incidents that involved 346 victims.

Offenses by Crime Category

• Of the 7,750 hate crime offenses classified as crimes against persons in 2020, 53.1% were for intimidation, 27.9% were for simple assault, and 17.9% were for aggravated assault. Twenty-two (22) murders and 21 rapes were reported as hate crimes. The remaining 32 hate crime offenses were reported in the category of other.
• Of the 3,147 hate crime offenses classified as crimes against property, most (74.1%) were acts of destruction/damage/vandalism. Robbery, burglary, larceny-theft, motor vehicle theft, arson, and other offenses accounted for the remaining 25.9% of crimes against property.
• Two hundred thirty-two (232) additional offenses were classified as crimes against society. This crime category represents society’s prohibition against engaging in certain types of activity such as gambling, prostitution, and drug violations. These are typically victimless crimes in which property is not the object.

Known Offenders

• In the UCR Program, the term known offender does not imply that the suspect’s identity is known; rather, the term indicates that some aspect of the suspect was identified, thus distinguishing the suspect from an unknown offender. Law enforcement agencies specify the number of offenders and, when possible, the race of the offender or offenders as a group. Beginning in 2013, law enforcement agencies began reporting whether suspects were juveniles or adults, as well as the suspect’s ethnicity when possible.
  • Of the 6,780 known offenders, 55.1% were white, and 21.2% were Black or African American. Other races accounted for the remaining known offenders: 1.1% were Asian, 1% were American Indian or Alaska Native, 0.5% were Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander, and 5.4% were of a group of multiple races. The race was unknown for 15.7%.
  • Of the 6,169 known offenders for whom ethnicity was reported, 39.3% were Not Hispanic or Latino, 10.2% were Hispanic or Latino, and 2.4% were in a group of multiple ethnicities. Ethnicity was unknown for 48.1% of these offenders.
  • Of the 6,264 known offenders for whom ages were known, 89.1% were 18 years of age or older.

Locations of Hate Crimes

Law enforcement agencies may specify the location of an offense within a hate crime incident as one of 46 location designations. In 2020, most hate crime incidents (28.9%) occurred in or near residences/homes. Nearly 20% (19.9) occurred on highways/roads/alleys/streets/sidewalks, 6.5% happened at parking/drop lots/garages, 4.2% occurred at schools/colleges, 3.6% occurred at parks/playgrounds, and 3.4% took place in churches/synagogues/temples/mosques. The location was reported as other/unknown for 8.6% of hate crime incidents. The remaining 24.8% of hate crime incidents took place at other or multiple locations.

The FBI's "Investigation" Of Kavanaugh Was Just A Joke!

 I doubt this surprises most Democrats. We always thought the FBI didn't really put much effort into investigating Kavanaugh after he was nominated to the Supreme Court (and accusations of sexual abuse were leveled against him). Did the FBI make their own decision to do only a cursory investigation, or were they following orders from the Trump White House? I suspect the latter.

The following is what Steve Been of MSNBC.com had to say about it:

Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation hearings in the fall of 2018 were highly controversial for a variety of reasons, including the scope of the FBI background check that was supposed to be part of the process.

Two days before the Senate's confirmation vote, with the FBI review ostensibly complete, Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) said it appeared to be "a very thorough investigation." Nearly three years later, there's ample evidence to the contrary.

A group of Democratic senators is demanding more answers from the FBI after the agency revealed new details about the limited scope of its supplemental investigation into Brett Kavanaugh's background when he was a nominee for the Supreme Court. In a letter June 30 to Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., and Chris Coons, D-Del., made public Thursday, Jill Tyson of the FBI's congressional affairs office acknowledged that the department conducted only 10 additional interviews in its supplemental investigation, even though it had received over 4,500 tips.

According to the FBI's Tyson, said "relevant tips" from phone calls and messages were forwarded to the counsel's office in the Trump White House.

To be sure, it's impossible to say with confidence how many of the 4,500 tips had any legitimacy, but the fact that "relevant tips" were directed to the White House raises questions about the volume and seriousness of the possible leads and how they were treated.

Just as importantly, NBC News' report added, "It's unclear what became of the tips after that."

How reassuring.

The Washington Post's Ruth Marcus, who called the FBI review "laughable," made a compelling case against an incomplete process:

What did then-White House Counsel Donald McGahn do with the "relevant tips?" That, we do know: not a damn thing. McGahn had no interest in discovering what his handpicked nominee had done, or not done. He had every interest in ensuring that Kavanaugh be confirmed, facts be damned. If there was any follow-up within the FBI itself, there's no indication of that. And that is the outrage here. The FBI's investigation into sexual assault allegations against Kavanaugh wasn't designed to uncover the truth.

Donald Trump recently said, in reference to Kavanaugh, "I saved his life. He wouldn't even be in a law firm. Who would have had him? Nobody. Totally disgraced. Only I saved him.... I saved his life, and I saved his career."

It was a curious quote, which is now seen in a new light.

Gun Sales Have Risen Every Month Over Previous Year

The chart above is from the FBI. It shows the number of background checks done every month for the last two years. These background checks are one of the best ways to see how many guns were sold. Note that in every month of the past year, gun sales (as determined by background checks) was higher than in the same month the previous year.

This is not a good thing in a nation that has three mass shootings every two days (about 1.5 per day), and is again on track to record more than 40,000 gun deaths for this year.

NOTE -- the figures for gun sales are probably even higher, since many sales do not require a background check be done.

Border Cities Are Among The Safest Cities In The U.S.

 The chart above uses information about crime statistics from the FBI. It compares the eight largest border cities to eight other cities of their size. Note that the eight border cities have a lower violent crime rate than the other cities.

This is not new. It has been true for years. Trump has tried to claim the border cities have an enormous crime rate because of undocumented immigrants. That was always a lie! The border cities are among the safest cities in the United States, and always have been.

For 3rd Straight Year Hate Crimes Topped 7,000 In U.S.

 

The charts above are from the FBI website. They show the hate crimes committed in the United States in 2019. Those hate crimes topped 7,000 for the third year in a row (7,314 incidents with 8,812 victims -- with 51 fatalities). It was also the third year of the Trump administration. Considering how soft Trump has been of hate groups, I think there is a definite connection.

The 25 U.S. Cities With The Highest Murder Rates

The chart above uses statistics from the FBI's 2018 Crime Rate in the United States. It was found at cbsnews.com.

Hate Crimes Rose More Than 17% In Trump's First Year

The two charts above are from the FBI count of hate crimes in 2017 (the first year of the Trump administration). Note that the number of hate crimes rose by 17.2% (from 6,063 in 2016 to 7,106 in 2017). The vast majority of those hate crimes fall into three categories -- race/ethnicity/ancestry 58.1%, religion 22%, and sexual orientation 15.9%.

Isn't it pretty obvious that much of that increase is due to Donald Trump's hate rhetoric and failure to call out white supremacists and righting bigots -- giving them the belief that he supports their odious beliefs.

Trump promised to unite America if elected, but since taking office he has done more to divide Americans than any other president of either political party.

That Was No Investigation - Just A Republican P.R. Stunt

 The Economist / YouGov Poll was done between September 30th and October 2nd of a national sample of 1,500 adults, with a 2.9 point margin of error.

The Reuters / Ipsos Poll was done between September 25th and October 1st of a national sample of 4,057 adults, with a 2 point margin of error.

Both show (as other polls have shown) that a plurality of Americans oppose the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh to be a justice on the U.S. Supreme Court -- by a 14 point margin in the YouGov poll and by a 5 point margin in the Reuters poll.

The Republicans don't care what the public thinks though. They are now poised to confirm Kavanaugh as early as Saturday. The cable networks are abuzz over the possibility that Republican senators Collins, Murkowski, and Flake could vote NO. Don't hold your breath for that to happen. All three have reliably voted the party line in the past, and they will likely do so again.

Republican leaders are crowing about the "investigation" just completed by the FBI at the request of Trump. They claim it shows Kavanaugh is innocent of all charges and therefore should be confirmed.

That's a joke at best, and an outrageous lie at worst. There was no real investigation -- no effort to get to the truth! That's because the Republicans (and Trump) are afraid of what a real investigation might uncover. Trump severely restricted who the FBI could talk to in their "investigation". They talked to only 9 people. They did NOT talk to another groups of at least 40 people who had contacted the FBI wanting to testify. There was also no effort (thanks to Trump) to investigate the lies told by Kavanaugh to the Senate committee.

Why did they even bother with this sham investigation? Because Senate Republicans felt they needed some cover to avoid being punished in November. They thought a faux investigation could provide that cover if they could convince the public it was a real investigation. It wasn't, and I suspect no one was fooled.

Now the Republicans are proudly ready to put a liar, a likely sex abuser, and a man with the temperament of a mean drunk on the highest court in the land. It's shameful, and it will affect the court's reputation for decades to come.

The GOP deserves to be severely punished by the voters in November!

I'm Just Surprised It Took This Long For FBI To Fire Strzok

The FBI fired agent Peter Strzok -- the agent who texted personal and disparaging messages about Donald Trump to his FBI colleague (and lover) on his work phone. Both the phone and the account connected to the phone were government property.

Trump, as the tweet above shows, is trying to take advantage of Strzok's firing. As usual, Trump is lying. Strzok was not in charge of the investigation (witch hunt). Trump just wants to try to make the investigation look biased -- in spite of the fact that Mueller immediately removed Strzok from the investigation as soon as he learned of the offending texts.

I am far from being a Trump supporter (as regular readers of this blog will know). And some may expect me to try and defend Strzok. I can't do that.

Do I think Strzok was biased on his FBI investigations? No, I don't. Does he have a good reputation (outside of the texting). Yes, he does. By all accounts, Strzok was a good agent who did a good job for the agency. But that is not the question here.

I am not surprised that he was fired by the FBI. I'm just surprised that it took so long. And I cannot defend his actions. He did a very stupid thing. He used his government phone to make disparaging remarks about politicians. By doing so, he embarrassed his bosses and the FBI. No government agency will put up with that.

I have never been a federal employee, but I did work for the state of Texas for three decades. And I was issued a state phone and a state e-mail account. I, and my co-workers, knew we were not to misuse those accounts. We were not to use them for gossip, spreading jokes, or disparaging politicians (of either political party). Those accounts were for only one purpose -- to do the job more effectively for our employer (the state of Texas). We knew misusing them could (and probably would) result in losing our job.

I can't believe that an agent as experienced as Strzok didn't know the same thing. He used the government account so his wife wouldn't discover his lover (who he texted), and in those texts to his lover, he disparaged Trump and other politicians.That is a misuse of government property. Those accounts were paid for by the American taxpayer, and should not have been used in the way Strzok used them.

I understand why Strzok was fired, and I have no problem with it. But people should also understand that the firing does not make Trump innocent and does not make the Mueller investigation a witch hunt. In spite of what Trump wants us to believe, Mueller (and his staff) continue their work in a nonpartisan and professional manner.

Only Republicans Affected By Trump's Attacks On The FBI

The American public has a favorable view of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) -- with about 65% viewing them favorably and only 26% having an unfavorable opinion. That's about the same as it was back in 2010. But there has been a change in who views them favorably or unfavorably.

The reason for that change is Donald Trump's repeated attacks on that organization. Afraid of what they might find that would be detrimental or illegal in the way he campaigned in 2016, or the way he conducted his financial dealings. He has tried to make the FBI look like they are biased against him and are conducting a political "witch hunt".

His attacks have affected how Republicans (who seem willing to believe whatever lie he tells them) view the agency. Back in 2010, about 71% of Republicans had a favorable view of the FBI. This year, only 49% of Republicans have a favorable view -- a drop of 22 points.

But that change has only been among Republicans. Among Independents, the view has remained very steady -- 67% in 2010 and 65% in 2018 (a difference that is not statistically significant). Among Democrats, the favorable view of the FBI has actually risen by 9 points (from 68% in 2010 to 77% in
2018).

These numbers are from a recent Pew Research Center survey -- done between July 11th and 15th of a national sample of 1,007 adults, with a 3.7 point margin of error.

Nearly 3 Out Of 4 Republicans Are Remarkably Stupid

I seldom agree with Republicans on policy, but I was still shocked at the results of this poll. It seems that 72% of Republicans believe highly-ranked law enforcement officials (in FBI) broke the law to prevent Donald Trump from becoming president -- and 55% strongly believe that!

They believe Donald Trump's ridiculous accusation that the FBI planted a spy in his organization, and that spy was to gather information to keep Trump from becoming president.

This accusation simply makes no sense. If they wanted to prevent a Trump presidency, why did they wait until months after he was in office to admit there was an investigation starting in the summer of 2016 to see if the Trump campaign was colluding with a foreign government? Wouldn't it have made more sense to announce that before the election (like they did with the Clinton investigation)? Announcing the Clinton investigation and keeping the Trump investigation quiet seems to show the FBI actually was working in favor of Trump -- not against him.

Trump won the Electoral College by a razor-thin margin in a few states. If the FBI had really wanted to prevent his presidency, releasing information about their investigation before the election could easily have done that.

But common sense and facts are not things the current Republican base respect. They only care about the incessant flow of lies coming from the mouth of their orange demagogue. For them, whatever Trump says is true -- regardless of how ridiculous it is or how many facts prove it to be false.

The FBI has never embedded a spy in a presidential campaign, and they didn't do that with the Trump campaign. They were simply investigating some bragging by a Trump aide that Russia was providing help to the campaign. The FBI was just doing its job!

The chart above shows the result of a new Rasmussen Poll -- done on May 22nd and 23rd of a national sample of 1,000 likely voters, with a 3 point margin of error. The chart shows only the responses of Republicans.

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And that's not the only stupid thing Republicans believe. As the chart below shows, 48% of Republicans (and 50% of Trump voters) still believe there were 3 to 5 million fraudulent votes cast in the 2016 election (which is the only reason their orange narcissist didn't win the popular vote) and another35% of both groups aren't sure. Once again, more than 3/4's show their idiocy. There is not a shred of evidence that even a hundred fraudulent votes were cast in 2016.

This chart is from a Huffington Post / YouGov Poll -- done between May 17th and 20th of a national sample of 1,000 voters, with a 3.7 point margin of error.

Trump Exposes Himself As Mean, Petty, And Vindictive

(Caricature of a vicious Donald Trump is by DonkeyHotey.)

What if you had worked for a company for 20 years, and your peers considered you to be an honest and hard worker, but you got a new boss that hated you. He hated you because you knew he had mistreated your fellow workers and fired them without cause. You can't win a battle with him because he's the CEO and you're just a worker, so you announce your retirement. But one day before your retirement takes effect, that boss fires you -- and since he fired you, you will not receive the retirement pension that you worked for more than 20 years. Would you think that was fair?

Well, that is exactly what Donald Trump did to former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe. The actual firing was done by Trump personal hitman, Jeff Sessions, but make no mistake -- this firing has Trump's dirty fingerprints all over it. Trump has shown Americans just how mean, petty, and vindictive he really is by not letting McCabe retire with his pension. And he has used the office of the presidency to do it. It was a shameful act, and one that should anger all decent and hard-working citizens of this country.

All of that would be bad enough, but Trump then compounded his despicable behavior by celebrating it on Twitter. Taking an honorable man's pension for political purposes is something Trump is proud of --

Trump accused McCabe of lying to investigators. That was nonsense. Here is McCabe's statement in defense after the outrageous firing:

I have been an FBI Special Agent for over 21 years. I spent half of that time investigating Russian Organized Crime as a street agent and Supervisor in New York City. I have spent the second half of my career focusing on national security issues and protecting this country from terrorism. I served in some of the most challenging, demanding investigative and leadership roles in the FBI. And I was privileged to serve as Deputy Director during a particularly tough time.

For the last year and a half, my family and I have been the targets of an unrelenting assault on our reputation and my service to this country. Articles too numerous to count have leveled every sort of false, defamatory and degrading allegation against us. The President’s tweets have amplified and exacerbated it all. He called for my firing. He called for me to be stripped of my pension after more than 20 years of service. And all along we have said nothing, never wanting to distract from the mission of the FBI by addressing the lies told and repeated about us.

No more.

The investigation by the Justice Department’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) has to be understood in the context of the attacks on my credibility. The investigation flows from my attempt to explain the FBI’s involvement and my supervision of investigations involving Hillary Clinton. I was being portrayed in the media over and over as a political partisan, accused of closing down investigations under political pressure. The FBI was portrayed as caving under that pressure, and making decisions for political rather than law enforcement purposes. Nothing was further from the truth. In fact, this entire investigation stems from my efforts, fully authorized under FBI rules, to set the record straight on behalf of the Bureau, and to make clear that we were continuing an investigation that people in DOJ opposed.

The OIG investigation has focused on information I chose to share with a reporter through my public affairs officer and a legal counselor. As Deputy Director, I was one of only a few people who had the authority to do that. It was not a secret, it took place over several days, and others, including the Director, were aware of the interaction with the reporter. It was the type of exchange with the media that the Deputy Director oversees several times per week. In fact, it was the same type of work that I continued to do under Director Wray, at his request. The investigation subsequently focused on who I talked to, when I talked to them, and so forth. During these inquiries, I answered questions truthfully and as accurately as I could amidst the chaos that surrounded me. And when I thought my answers were misunderstood, I contacted investigators to correct them.

But looking at that in isolation completely misses the big picture. The big picture is a tale of what can happen when law enforcement is politicized, public servants are attacked, and people who are supposed to cherish and protect our institutions become instruments for damaging those institutions and people.

Here is the reality: I am being singled out and treated this way because of the role I played, the actions I took, and the events I witnessed in the aftermath of the firing of James Comey. The release of this report was accelerated only after my testimony to the House Intelligence Committee revealed that I would corroborate former Director Comey’s accounts of his discussions with the President. The OIG’s focus on me and this report became a part of an unprecedented effort by the Administration, driven by the President himself, to remove me from my position, destroy my reputation, and possibly strip me of a pension that I worked 21 years to earn. The accelerated release of the report, and the punitive actions taken in response, make sense only when viewed through this lens. Thursday’s comments from the White House are just the latest example of this.

This attack on my credibility is one part of a larger effort not just to slander me personally, but to taint the FBI, law enforcement, and intelligence professionals more generally. It is part of this Administration’s ongoing war on the FBI and the efforts of the Special Counsel investigation, which continue to this day. Their persistence in this campaign only highlights the importance of the Special Counsel’s work.

I have always prided myself on serving my country with distinction and integrity, and I always encouraged those around me to do the same. Just ask them. To have my career end in this way, and to be accused of lacking candor when at worst I was distracted in the midst of chaotic events, is incredibly disappointing and unfair. But it will not erase the important work I was privileged to be a part of, the results of which will in the end be revealed for the country to see.

I have unfailing faith in the men and women of the FBI and I am confident that their efforts to seek justice will not be deterred.