A former federal law enforcement agent is sounding the alarm over a recent report that Ron DeSantis has for months been planning to overhaul the FBI and the Justice Department.
Former FBI assistant director for counter-intelligence Frank Figliuzzi during an appearance on MSNBC’s “Deadline: White House” with Nicole Wallace called the suggestion that federal law enforcement agencies answer directly to the executive branch -- as DeSantis’ plans call for -- a “scary, scary prospect.”
“Yeah, I think this is an important time to ask, should I care about this?" Figliuzzi asked.
“It sounds like a lot of political rhetoric about smashing the FBI to pieces and remaking it in the image of Ron DeSantis or Donald Trump. I spend a lot of time thinking about the future of DOJ and the FBI and if, indeed, people like this were to get into power, and if the answer to the question ‘why should I care?’ is to look at what the FBI has done for you, your community and this nation.”
Figliuzzi touted some of the FBI’s important accomplishments, noting that, just within the last year, the agency has arrested over 20,000 violent criminals and child predators, dismantled 400 violent gangs, and over the last five years has rescued some 8,000 child victims of sex trafficking.
“If you want that to go away -- right, because Ron DeSantis is essentially saying there really wouldn't be an FBI as you know it -- there's proposals that he's mentioned to do away with the (FBI) director’s role, the role of the position of the director,” Figliuzzi said.
“Think about what that means," he added. "It means that this idea that we have a neutral FBI, that the director serves for 10 years, straddles administrations so that he can't he or she cannot be removed for political whim, that would go away, and then essentially with no director, the FBI would work for the politically appointed attorney general of the United States, and so we would literally have a police agency that serves at the whim of a political appointee who works for Ron DeSantis or Donald Trump or you name the authoritarian figure.”
Figliuzzi said a source told him that efforts to split the FBI into two agencies – one for domestic intelligence and security and the other serving as a law enforcement agency – “because the agency wears two hats” goes back to the Clinton administration.
“Think about a domestic spy agency that answers to Ron DeSantis or Donald Trump,” Figliuzzi said.
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