The Trump administration Thursday gave an explanation over why Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard was at the FBI raid at an election office in Georgia, but it is laughable, according to one expert.
The FBI Wednesday raided an elections center in Fulton County, Georgia. President Donald Trump has continued to insist that election fraud cost him the 2020 election, despite no clear evidence that this happened.
A Trump administration official, whose name was not released, Thursday released a statement to MS NOW about why Gabbard was involved in the raid.
"Director Gabbard has a pivotalrole in election security andprotecting the integrity of ourelections against interference,including operations targetingvoting systems, databases andelection infrastructure. Shehas and will continue to takeaction on President Trump'sdirective to secure ourelections and work with ourinteragency partners to do so," the Trump administration official said.
Former FBI special agent Michael Feinberg reacted to the Trump administration's statement and cast doubt on why Gabbard should have been at the location.
"It doesn't pass the laugh test for anybody who's actually worked in this world. And there's a couple reasons for that," Feinberg said.
"First of all, this was collection of evidence," Feinberg explained. "There is nothing there that cannot be reported to Tulsi Gabbard once they have processed it, analyzed it, and made and finished doing whatever they were doing on site. Again, it is unheard of for non-law enforcement personnel to take place in the execution of a search warrant. Secondly, this is a criminal investigation. It is looking at past conduct. Even if we believed that Tulsi Gabbard should be involved in law enforcement actions relating to the security of our elections, that is only something that she would be doing if there was something happening presently or in the future. It is inexplicable that there was why she was there. There is literally no legitimate reason that she should have been on site."