FBI Director Christopher Wray was accused of a “lack of transparency” by a Republican congressman who told him point blank that he didn’t trust him.
Testifying before the House Committee on Appropriations on Thursday, Wray eventually faced Rep. Mike Garcia, R-Calif., who minced no words in calling out the FBI chief on his “inability to lead” among other things.
“Wray met with the House Appropriations subcommittee on Thursday afternoon urging Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) to be reauthorized by Congress and to discuss next year’s budget, and while some of the discussion involved dollar figures, the FBI director was there to defend efforts to fend off terrorist attacks and the infiltration of the U.S. by violent gangs through the southern border, many of which are connected to the fentanyl epidemic,” Fox News reported.
I was very direct with FBI Director Wray: I don’t trust him, and he’s failing to protect Americans from the national security and humanitarian crisis at our southern border.
Under this administration there have been…
-7.5 million illegal crossings
-1.7 million known gotaways… pic.twitter.com/674LCaOF0Y— Rep. Mike Garcia (@RepMikeGarcia) April 11, 2024
“I’ll be honest with you, and this pains me to say this, but I don’t trust you,” Garcia said to Wray when his turn came for questioning.
“I don’t think that this is necessarily a funding problem that we have for your agency as much as a leadership problem,” the GOP lawmaker added.
Garcia pointed to a “lack of transparency in hearings like this ” as well as the “weaponization and politicization of issues and instruments of national security against innocent Americans, and against institutions like churches.”
“The fact that you have held no one truly accountable for prior FISA abuses that we have all seen and recognized,” Garcia continued, accusing Wray of “standing by relatively silent and passive about the biggest national security threat to our nation, that being our very open southern border.”
He told the FBI director that he gave”very little credence in either your ability to do this job or, frankly, lead the brave agents below you.”
“I don’t trust you to protect us,” the lawmaker said. “I think because of your inability to lead and also shape the policies at the DOJ and at the White House, we are now in a more precarious position than we were, I would submit, than we were on September 10th of 2001.”
Garcia then used Wray’s own words from his prepared remarks to drive home his point.
“We don’t only pay you to warn us of a threat…but we also pay you to prevent and protect us from the threats,” Garcia noted.
The congressman further said that Americans have been put into a “clear and present danger situation” thanks to Wray, Attorney General Merrick Garland, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, and President Biden.
“You have been unable to change the policies driven by your leadership,” Garcia told Wray.
“Can I just get a simple yes or no response,” Garcia asked. “Does the border policy make your job easier or harder, or are we safer or less safe as a result of the open border policy?”
He also asked Wray if he had gone to the president to say that the “border policy is a galactic stupid policy from a national security perspective.”
“Well, I’m not going to get into specific conversations with people,” Wray replied. “I’ve been consistent in my message externally and internally about my concerns about the threats that are from the FBI’s perspective, that emanate from the border.”
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