A whistleblower alleges that the FBI’s Security Division suspends or revokes the security clearances of agents on the basis of their political affiliations or lack of COVID-19 vaccination.
(LifeSiteNews) – The Security Division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is abusing security clearance approval to oust agents believed to be politically conservative, according to a whistleblower complaint reviewed by the New York Post.
The Post reported that the unidentified whistleblower alleges that the nation’s top law enforcement agency suspends or revokes clearances of agents on the basis of their political affiliations or lack of COVID-19 vaccination, because “if an FBI employee fit a certain profile as a political conservative, they were viewed as security concerns and unworthy to work at the FBI.”
The allegations directly contradict sworn testimony denying the practice to Congress last year by Jennifer Leigh Moore, the Security Division’s assistant director.
A nonprofit called Empower Oversight is representing the whistleblower and submitted his claims to the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Office of the Inspector General (OIG) and Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) on June 28. Empower president Tristan Leavitt also told Congress in a letter that the FBI is also retaliating against the agent for what he is trying to expose.
“The outcomes of clearance investigations and adjudications were often pre-determined by the Division’s acting Deputy Assistant Director and the acting Section Chief responsible for security clearance investigations and adjudications, who often overruled line staff and even dictated the wording of documents in the clearance process,” Leavitt wrote. “Over the last few years, the FBI has used the clearance process as a means to force employees out of the FBI by inflicting severe financial distress: suspending their clearance, suspending them from duty without pay, requiring them to obtain permission to take any other job while stuck in this unpaid limbo, and delaying their final clearance adjudication indefinitely — even years.”
One victim of such practices was former FBI staff operations specialist Marcus Allen, who last year was revealed to have lost his security clearance for circulating news articles and opinion videos related to the January 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol riot for “situational awareness,” according to an interim report by the House Judiciary Committee and Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government. “Because these open-source articles questioned the FBI’s handling of the violence at the Capitol, the FBI suspended Allen for ‘conspiratorial views in regard to the events of January 6th.’”
The FBI responded to the latest news by claiming it “takes seriously its responsibility to FBI employees who make protected disclosures under whistleblower regulations,” and that the “security clearance adjudication process requires multiple levels of review to ensure decisions are in compliance with applicable policies and procedures. Those policies and procedures do not allow security clearance actions to be taken for improper reasons such as an individual exercising First Amendment protected rights, to include an individual’s political or medical views, or ethnicity or any other protected class.”
Nevertheless, the story adds further detail to an ongoing picture of a federal law enforcement apparatus that critics say has been weaponized against the political opponents of the current administration and like-minded entrenched federal bureaucrats.
The use of agencies such as the FBI to retaliate against political opponents while treating more ideologically aligned lawbreakers more softly has been one of the most alarming facets of Joe Biden’s presidency, from prosecuting pro-life activists while neglecting pro-abortion violence and painting parents critical of left-wing classroom indoctrination as dangerous, to disproportionate prosecution of January 6 attendees for nonviolent offenses and retaliation against FBI agents who objected.
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