House Judiciary Committee Republicans said Thursday that a top former FBI official must testify before Congress to address whistleblower claims alleging the Biden administration pressured agents to inflate domestic violent extremism (DVE) cases.
Representatives sent a letter to Jill Sanborn, a former Assistant Director of the FBI Counterterrorism Division and Executive Assistant Director of the National Security Branch, who the whistleblower accused as one the top officials exerting pressure on agents.
House representatives said the former FBI official would sit down for a transcribed interview with committee members “investigating several allegations concerning the politicization of the FBI.”
“Whistleblower disclosures made by multiple FBI employees from different field offices suggest that FBI agents are bolstering the number of cases of DVEs to satisfy their supervisors,” House GOP Reps. Jim Jordan (OH) and Mike Johnson (LA) wrote.
While Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has said domestic violent extremism is the “greatest threat” to the United States, whistleblowers have sounded the alarm about the corruption and weaponization of the alphabet agency since the Biden administration took office in 2021.
One example the lawmakers shared explained that FBI officials allegedly “encouraged and incentivized” agents to reclassify such cases because the bureau was not finding enough, “even though there is minimal, circumstantial evidence to support the reclassification.”
“Another whistleblower stated that a field office Counterterrorism Assistant Special Agent in Charge and the FBI’s then Assistant Director of the Counterterrorism Division pressured agents to move cases into the DVE category to hit self-created performance metrics,” GOP officials said to Sanborn. “This whistleblower identified you as one official who exerted pressure on agents to reclassify cases as DVE matters.”
According to the GOP House members, Sandborn served in the agency from January 2020 to April 2021.
The Washington Times reported that former and current top FBI leaders “have already determined that White supremacy is a problem,” adding they have already begun reclassifying cases to fit that narrative.
“We are sort of the lapdogs as the actual agents doing these sorts of investigations, trying to find a crime to fit otherwise First Amendment-protected activities,” one whistleblower told The Washington Times. “If they have a Gadsden flag, and they own guns, and they are mean at school board meetings, that’s probably a domestic terrorist.”
An FBI spokesperson declined to comment on if Ms. Sanborn agreed to testify, per The Washington Times.
The news comes off the heels of several ongoing accusations that the Biden administration weaponized the agency against the American people.
From storming former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home, targeting pro-life activists for standing up for unborn children, and allegedly contacting Facebook-creator Mark Zuckerberg to suppress Hunter Biden’s laptop ahead of the 2020 Presidential Election — the latest revelations alleged by whistleblowers have only fanned the flames for public and private citizens calling to dismantle the bureau.
Last month, FBI officials told GOP House members that the bureau focuses only on those “who commit or intend to commit violence and criminal activity that constitutes a federal crime or poses a threat to national security.”
“We cannot and do not investigate ideology,” the bureau said. “The FBI’s mission is to protect the American people and uphold the Constitution. One does not come at the expense of the other.”
House Judiciary Committee members will interview Sanborn on Dec. 2.
#BREAKING: Former FBI official Jill Sanborn to Appear for Transcribed Interview with House Judiciary Committee on December 2, 2022 pic.twitter.com/31OsTYaHMf
— House Judiciary GOP (@JudiciaryGOP) October 20, 2022