WASHINGTON (AP) — Former FBI employees accused the bureau of politicization in congressional testimony Thursday, a day after the agency disclosed that two of the men had their security clearances revoked over concerns about how his views on the Capital attack on January 6. 2021, it affected his work.
The three men alleged overreach and retaliation by the FBI in testimony before a special House committee investigating what Republicans say is the federal government’s “weaponizing” of conservatives.
“If you’re not politically correct … you’re not in line with what they think is the political position or the right position, you’re the target,” said Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, the committee’s Republican chairman. say in his opening statement.
Former FBI employees Marcus Allen and Steve Friend testified before the panel just hours after the FBI informed Jordan in a letter Wednesday, obtained by The Associated Press, that the two men had been stripped of their clearances of security after attending the 2021 Capitol riot or partnering an alternate. theories about the attack.
A crowd of pro-Trump rioters, some armed with pipes, bats and bear spray, charged the Capitol on January 6, 2021, quickly overpowering the overwhelmed police officers trying to contain them. More than 100 policemen were injured, many beaten, bleeding and bruised. More than 1,000 people have been prosecuted in the Jan. 6 attack on a range of charges, from low-level misdemeanors for those who only entered the Capitol to seditious conspiracy charges against far-right extremists.
“My colleagues have brought in these former agents, men who lost their security clearances because they were a threat to our national security,” said Rep. Stacey Plaskett, the committee’s top Democrat. “People who out of malice or ignorance or both have put their partisan agenda above the oath they took to serve this country and protect its national security.”
Jordan and other Republicans on the committee praised the former FBI employees as grassroots patriots who faced retribution for speaking out against government abuses. Allen, Friend and Garrett O’Boyle, a former field agent, shared stories with the committee about how they said their decision to run has resulted in suspensions and firings from their positions.
“My oath did not include sacrificing my family’s hopes, dreams and livelihood,” O’Boyle said.
Many of them testified about their personal struggles, including not being able to find work elsewhere and struggling to support their loved ones and young children while their cases were investigated.
“I sacrificed my dream job to share this information with the American people,” Friend stated. “I humbly request all members to do their jobs and consider the merit of what I have presented.”
But Democrats rejected the testimony and called the hearing another attempt by Republicans on the committee to help former President Donald Trump.
“This select committee is a clearinghouse for testing conspiracy theories for Donald Trump to use in his 2024 presidential campaign,” Plaskett added.
The FBI letter detailed how Friend refused to participate in the SWAT team’s arrest of a suspect in the Jan. 6 uprising while serving in Florida and “supported an alternative narrative” about the attack Friend maintained the show of force was not necessary.
Allen, a former operations specialist at the FBI’s field office in Charlotte, North Carolina, also supported “alternative theories” about January 6 to co-workers several times, even after his supervisor told him to stop, according to the FBI letter. Allen disputed those findings, and an attorney for both men suspended their security clearances in retaliation against the whistleblowers.
“I am hopeful that scrutiny from Congress and the inspector general will deter the FBI from abusing the security clearance process to retaliate against others as I was retaliated against,” Allen told the committee.
The FBI, however, has said that of the agency’s nearly 80,000 employees, only 32 currently have their clearances suspended, a sharp departure from GOP claims that retaliation against rank-and-file personnel is widespread. That’s according to recently transcribed testimony from Jennifer Leigh Moore, the agency’s executive assistant director of human resources.
A third employee who did not testify had his security clearance revoked after entering the restricted area around the Capitol on Jan. 6, and later provided false or misleading information to investigators about what he did day, the FBI letter said. All three employees can appeal security clearance decisions.
Two of the former FBI employees who testified, Friend and O’Boyle, acknowledged receiving money from Kash Patel, a close Trump ally who served in various roles in his administration and now oversees a charity.
They said they needed that money to support their families after FBI suspensions left them unable to work, but Democrats said the ties show the partisan nature of the “weaponization” investigation.
In a series of contentious exchanges, Democrats complained that one of Thursday’s witnesses, Allen, was interviewed only by Republican lawmakers on the committee. Many pointed to House rules that require minority and state majority staff to have equal access to witness testimony, regardless of whether it’s a whistleblower account or not.
Since January, House Democrats on both the Select Committee and the Judiciary have accused Jordan and GOP lawmakers of shutting them out of several transcribed interviews, refusing to allow them into the room or provide official transcripts or videos of interviews after the fact.
“We’re in the dark. That’s not how Congress works. That’s not how committees work,” said Democratic Representative Dan Goldman of New York.
The select committee’s investigation has also encompassed social media companies and other large companies. Committee Republicans released a report ahead of the hearing with new allegations against the FBI, including that Bank of America had given the FBI data on all its customers who made transactions in Washington, D.C., during the days around January 6th.
Lawmakers played video testimony from George Hill, a retired FBI National Security Intelligence supervisor, who told the committee about the list after seeing it in the system, though he said that never opened it. Bank of America provided the information to the FBI voluntarily, according to Hill’s testimony, although it was unclear whether and how the agency might have used the data.
Bank of America issued a brief statement to The Associated Press, saying it follows the law to “respond closely” to law enforcement requests, but did not directly say whether it shared customer data. with the FBI.
“We do not comment on our communications with law enforcement,” said bank spokeswoman Naomi Patton. “The report’s suggestion that Bank of America proactively searched our data for broad types of customer behavior, such as making any purchase in a specific city on a specific day, did not occur.”
Democrats have said Hill was among former FBI employees who are “deeply biased,” citing social media posts where some committee witnesses have referred to Jan. 6 as a “setup.”
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Associated Press writer Ken Sweet in New York contributed to this report.
