Ex-FBI agents say Grassley played improper role in their firings

Several former FBI agents are arguing Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) played a significant role in their firings, removals that followed his release of a number of unredacted materials about the criminal investigation into President Trump.

That assertion was made in two separate lawsuits against the FBI that don’t name Grassley as a defendant but point to his actions as a factor precipitating the firing of agents who worked on former special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into the riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

The suits allege the agents were wrongfully terminated based solely on their assignment to Smith’s team — work that one of the suits argues the FBI now sees as “somehow hostile partisan acts.”

The litigation also raises questions about the Senate Judiciary Committee’s sprawling investigation into Smith’s Arctic Frost probe, as well as Grassley’s role in a conservative ecosystem focused on addressing what Republicans have branded as “rot” at the FBI.

Grassley’s disclosures include the unredacted names of agents, something their attorney argues sparks not only online vitriol but backlash from the bureau as it culls employees. 

“It is appalling to me that lawmakers would so carelessly mischaracterize these unredacted disclosures, knowing that the direct result of their actions is to cause an ill-informed online mob to go after honest, hardworking federal law enforcement officers,” said Margaret Donovan, a former federal prosecutor now representing two agents suing the FBI.

“The best-case scenario is that Grassley is so far past his prime, he is clueless as to what he’s doing. The worst-case scenario is that Grassley and others are intentionally trying to harm federal agents who dared to investigate criminal activity, which happened to implicate a political ally,” she added, nodding to Grassley’s status as the oldest sitting senator at age 92.

As part of his investigation, Grassley has released reams of documents from Smith’s probe, including subpoenas sent to conservative activists as well as the phone records of senators believed to have spoken with Trump on Jan. 6. 

Some of the released documents were grand jury materials not typically shared with the public. The Department of Justice (DOJ) is largely prohibited from sharing those types of materials with Congress, raising questions about the identities of the whistleblowers who shared them with Grassley.  

To Trump’s supporters, the documents peel back the layers of an unwarranted investigation into the president.

But to critics, Grassley is misrepresenting a properly opened investigation into the president — one in which agents took sound legal actions at the direction of a supervisor — by showing limited snapshots of Smith’s criminal probe.

Grassley has said many of the sensitive documents come from whistleblowers in addition to the FBI and that he has not coordinated with the bureau on any personnel decisions.

“The Hill is parroting a totally false narrative designed to malign Chairman Grassley’s dogged oversight and intimidate the brave whistleblowers who’ve risked their careers to expose the truth behind the weaponized Arctic Frost investigation through the provision of thousands of pages of records that were hidden from the public,” Clare Slattery, a spokesperson for Grassley, said in a statement to The Hill.

“Whistleblowers know Chuck Grassley is the sharpest and most seasoned investigator on Capitol Hill who will always defend and protect them, which is why they keep coming to his office. No amount of government agents who abused their power or leftist media smears will ever change that fact or undermine the........

© The Hill