Republican lawmakers scared of political violence are being drowned out by GOP leaders: ex-DOJ official
Many Republicans are aware that the rhetoric of their party is increasingly driving political violence — but their concerns and objections are being ignored and "drowned out" by leadership, argued Mary McCord, the former acting Assistant Attorney General for National Security.
This comes as former President Donald Trump increasingly targets prosecutors and judges involved in his criminal cases with personal language — and threats mount against them, including a Texas woman who threatened to kill Judge Tanya Chutkan.
"I think the fingerprints of it are all over everyone who said and did nothing," said anchor Nicolle Wallace. "I go back to 9/11 all the time: if you say something, see something, is what was asked of citizens. Now, you know, when Donald Trump accused [former FBI Deputy Director] Andrew McCabe of treason ... Republicans didn't say anything. They didn't say no, he didn't. They said and did nothing," she turned to former FBI Agent Peter Strzok. "I wonder what you think, the damage done by silence. Is that complicity? Is it danger? Is it undoable?"
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"Of course it is complicit," said Strzok. "The fact is, multiple years in the Trump presidency with the large bulk of the federal bureaucracy doing nothing to push back against his outrageous comments and outrageous commands created lasting harm. You mentioned 9/11. I think about the work we did on the international terrorism front, and January 6th and the failures. When I look at the FBI, when I look at law enforcement and of thinking about how do we approach this new threat, how much do we need to rebalance or rethink the level that we want law enforcement looking at these threats, because there's such a hesitancy leading up to January 6th to look at anything which might be construed as political speech, no matter how violent, I think there's a very real need for a discussion about do we need to rebalance where that line is for federal investigations, given the violence that we're seeing. We absolutely have to do something. I think we did ourselves a huge disservice as a nation by not saying and doing things more during the Trump presidency, but it's more than overdue to do that right now."
"And Mary, how does that start?" asked Wallace. "I mean, where does that happen?"
"Well, I want to go back to your question before the break about, you know, do Republicans care about political violence, and I would submit that there are many who do. As a matter of fact, many of the victims of threats and violence have been Republicans, Republican election officials, Republican elected officials, and unfortunately, these people, I think right now, are feeling somewhat powerless because those in the party who are sucking all the air out of the room, getting all of the attention, are using and capitalizing on political violence for their own political gain and political purposes because they think it plays well with the base. And so I actually, because I have been out, you know, doing meetings with regional officials at every level, Republicans and Democrats, they are coming and sitting down in closed-door sessions with Democrats to talk about combating political violence, but their voice is being drowned out by the voices of others who are louder or as you say are complicit in their silence."
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