On Thursday morning, the FBI Director Christopher Wray defended his agency to the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee. He said "There is no finer institution than the FBI and no finer people than the men and women who work there.” This was in response to President Trump’s recent tweet which said the FBI’s "reputation is in Tatters - worst in history! But fear not, we will bring it back to greatness."
People have been critical of Robert Mueller's investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election. Peter Strzok was removed from the investigation team because it was found that he had sent text messages that said negative things about Donald Trump during the election. President Trump’s supporters often use Strzok to backup their argument that Mueller's team is biased and they also claim that other team members donated to Democratic candidates. Last week another agent was removed from the investigation team because he sent negative text messages about Trump which triggered the president’s tweet.
I can see the desire to create an investigative team that is unbiased, but creating a group of people who have no political preference is incredibly difficult especially since the team members are probably surrounded by politics. I would hope agents would be able to put their political views aside and investigate Russian involvement without bias but considering how polarized America is right now that may be impossible.
Do you agree with Trump’s claim that the FBI’s reputation is in “tatters”? Are you worried about the investigation team being biased?
16 comments:
There are no recent actions undertaken by the FBI that give Trump a valid reason to claim their reputation is in "tatters." Rather, Trump is once again using social media to express his personal offense. All presidents in history have dealt with citizens who disapprove of their performance, but Trump definitely handles criticism in the most petty and immature manner possible. I do not think the team members are biased, either. It is unconstitutional under the First Amendment to fire the team members who spoke negatively of Trump. The only case in which the team members' text messages would not be protected by their freedom of speech would be if the text messages were trying to a "clear and present danger." Obviously, they were not.
To add on to Diana's point, there isn't much reason to believe the current reputation of the FBI is in shambles. Rather, with the pervasive presence of the FBI's ongoing investigations into Trump's administration on Russian involvement, I believe Trump is once again taking things personally and retaliating through denouncement on twitter. Additionally, the notion that the team may be biased is controversial either way. If they don't let go of agents, people will claim they're biased against Trump. If they do let go of agents, people will claim they're biased in favor of Trump. I agree with Brooke that it's very hard to keep a politically neutral team, and that letting go multiple agents is suspicious, but it is hard to decide what the better path of action may be, considering the argument of bias in their team may be more strong if they keep the agents on.
Regarding President Trumps tweets about the FBI, it is not unusual for him to make aggressive tweets to defend himself. I definitely agree with Hannah and Diana that the FBI's reputation is not ruined. However, because of the polarization in today's society, there will be those who support what they're doing and those who disagree with what they're doing.
The investigative team is almost certainly biased, whether for or against Trump. I don't believe any bias, even if it is likely against the President, should alter their investigation. No amount of bias can change the hard, factual evidence and results of their investigation, whether President Trump is innocent or not. Bias does not have the ability to create evidence against the President, so I think it's pretty harmless. At least I think...
With the firing of Comey, I think Trump has made it quite clear that the Russian investigation has caused Trump to panic and retaliate in his typical manner : harsh rhetoric, denouncement, and position removal. Trump’s immature actions only raise suspicion as to why he is repeatedly avoiding and worming his way out of the Russian investigation, and if Trump has committed unconstitutional acts that he is currently attempting to hide. Due to the political environment, it is quite difficult to prevent bias because almost everyone has a political belief that they stand by and it is idealistic thinking if one is trying to evade bias. If everyone who is against Trump is removed, then we are left with Trump supporters who may be more inclined to favor or twist their research to portray Trump in a positive light.
I agree with Shweta that this is just typical Trump throwing a tantrum when things don't go his way. I also think it's interesting that FBI agents' texts are being checked as the source of these accusations. I think government agents should know better than to say bad things on their, I'd assume, government-issued phones. Also, it's interesting that FBI investigators on Mueller's team donated to the Democratic Party. Should FBI agents take part in such political advocacy? I feel like them donating to political campaigns automatically puts them in the limelight for criticism, being that the FBI is a government institution which doesn't change with the presidential administration. Having bias, or opinions, is natural, but FBI investigators should know better not to overtly show it.
As the others said, I feel like this is just another one of Trump's outburst tweets that he does to try to elevate himself or diminish others. But looking at both sides, we can see that the FBI has been involved in recent events leading to more publicity, and not all of it good. For example, the case with the FBI versus Apple to be able to check criminals' phones stretched out for a long time, and there was support in favor of both sides, so this wasn't an easy case for the FBI to deal with. Events like this have definitely caused awareness for some people about how the FBI is running, but definitely not to the extent that Trump probably means. As for the second question, I would not be surprised if the investigation team is biased, only because of the immense opposition and backlash Trump continuously encounters. His actions and mentality may appeal to some, but also anger so many others, to the point where it's extremely easy to find a Trump-opposer in many parts of the country, especially in the government. So their bias, if they have any, in my opinion, would be totally justified and unsurprising.
I am worried that the FBI is becoming too involved in politics. That being said, I don't really understand when people complain that the FBI firing these employees shows an obvious bias. If the FBI had a bias, wouldn't they have not fired the employees? So, while this news story does air their dirty laundry, I think it actually shows that they are making efforts to revert back to being apolitical. We'll see if it works.
Everyone is biased in some way that comes from a result of how, where, or when they grew up. The FBI agents can only try to do their best to not allow their biases to influence their work. Trump is attacking them because they are investigating him. Trump has a pattern of attacking anything that may pose a threat to him. Other institutions that are supposed to be unbiased that he attacks are the judiciary branch and the media. In this case, there is no reason to think that the work of the FBI is biased just because Trump says so. It is just his defense mechanism.
I do not think that the FBI team is biased, as proved by these people being fired. The team tries to be as non-partisan as possible, much the same as other committees in the government, and it is very hard to find people who are actually non-partisan, so the government can only do its best. The fact that the people who have been seen to be biased have been fired shows that the committee is trying its best to stay unbiased. With even small infractions such as a text leading to people being fired, it makes me trust the committee even more. There are inherent biases in everyone and in every committee, but Muller is reducing them as much as he can by taking out each person who shows any bias.
Like the others have said above, the only real recent damage to the FBI's reputation is that which Trump has sown himself by firing Comey primarily for personal reasons. Even more worrying is the fact that he tries to portray himself as a sort of "savior of the FBI", giving him an excuse to potentially intervene further than a tweet.
I think that most of this is Trump just trying to weaken his opposition. By discrediting the FBI investigation, he is preemptively crippling their claims before they have conclusive evidence. It is important, however, to make sure that they are not biased. However, it is possible for people to have political opinions without carrying it over into their work. Ideally these are the kinds of people who are conducting the investigation and determining the future of our nation.
I disagree with Trump’s claim that the FBI’s reputation is in “tatters,” as it is Trump who has grown opposed to them investigating ties with Russia. I don’t believe bias plays a great role in this - the investigative team is just aiming to do their job and investigate Trump’s case. If their political views became so tied into their work and affecting how they decide to do their job, the team would be risking their jobs and positions, which I don’t think they’d choose to do. I agree with others that Trump’s criticism comes from personal issues and disfavor, not the FBI’s involvement.
I think that taking people of the investigation team because of their political preference isn't right. People have their own opinions about things so it would be almost impossible to create a team that have no political preference whatsoever. If these were text messages that were sent of duty I think that drawing the conclusion that they would be biased in their investigation is too much, the people working must be able to have their own opinions about politics in private. However, if there were evidence that they are being biased in their investigation because of their own personal opinion, I believe that it would be right to take them of the investigation team.
There are two sides to the issue. I do not agree with Trump's actions about taking people off the investigation team for talking poorly about Trump. The United States is a nation of free speech and it is disappointing to see that it could potentially loose your job while working in the FBI. Through his actions, I get the message that Trump fears to be challenged and have people work against him. But like Johan said, if there was evidence of being biased in investigation, Trump has every right to take them off.
I do not agree with Trump’s claim that the FBI’s reputation is in “tatters,” because Trump was opposed to them searching ties with Russia. FBI's reputation could be at stake, but Trump is trying to make a huge scene out of it by embellishing the truth. I agree with Shweta that Trump is acting like a fool because he can't handle when things don't go their way. With the presence of the FBI's ongoing investigations into Trump's administration on Russian involvement, I believe Trump is taking things to heart. The investigative team show some biases for sure whether they are against Trump or not. If their political views alter the way they work, then their positions would be at stake which would not be ideal.
To answer the question, I do not think that the FBI's reputation is in "tatters" just because of the negative comments made by two of the members of the investigation team. Not only do I not believe it because it comes from Trump, but I also do not believe it because I do not completely know if the investigation team is biased or not. From the actions of two people, it is a stretch to just go and assume that the whole committee is biased, but who knows? Maybe the team is biased...but is that really a concern? Perhaps they are acting biased because they have incriminating information about they President. If you had that type of information, I think that it would be hard to not act biased towards him. Even if they don't have any information about the President, it is almost impossible to create a bipartisan investigation team, as everyone is entitled to their own opinions about the President. Overall, I think that Trump made this claim because he is scared and things are not going in his favor.
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