Reaction & Commentary
Christopher Ray’s Congressional testimony was filled with speculation on everything from Biden’s cognitive Health to whether or not a bullet actually pierced Donald Trump’s ear but the most pervasive question continues to be how did a 20-year-old manage to slip past the secret Services radar is there any evidence at all that he may have been in contact with somebody else before this occurred that may have had any prior knowledge or may have helped him plan this event well needless to say that that is a question that we’re intensely focused on because that would obviously be incredibly meaningful so far underline so far we have not found any evidence uh of any accomplice or co-conspirators uh foreign or domestic and you’re using geolocation data to see if his cell phone was near another cell phone I presume right we’re doing lots of different kinds of cellular analysis uh geolocation stuff looking at his accounts uh he he from everything we’ve seen um which is consistent with what we’ve learned in interviews you know a lot of people describe him as a loner that does kind of fit with what we’re seeing in his devices you know his his list of contacts for example uh is very short you know compared to what you would normally see from from most people to help us break it all down we have Steve Baker Blaze media investigative reporter and Steve friend senior fellow for the center for renewing America and FBI whistleblower Steve friend uh let’s start with you from your previous experience how transparent do you think the FBI will be for this public investigation well I think that we have a proof of concept the FBI loves to hide behind we can’t reveal sources and methods it’s an ongoing investigation we’re just going to drag this out as long as we possibly can until people either lose interest or there’s something else that we can get our hooks into that’s going to do better for us in the headlines the FBI has a track record of even investigating assassination attempts pretty poorly you look to the capital baseball shooting that happened in I believe 2017 where Steve scis was shot and the shooter there was a Bernie Sanders supporter showed up at the parking lot asked where the Republicans were well the FBI ruled that a suicide by cop not an assassination attempt so I don’t have any confidence in them to actually carry forward an honest and forthright investigation of any kind because they’ve demonstrated themselves to be just a politically partisan an organization particularly as it pertains to Donald Trump at this point Steve there was a lot of fascination with director Ray’s testimony yesterday for one thing he appeared to be more forthright than he’s been in any previous Congressional hearings did you get that impression or do you see something else that was going on there that maybe wasn’t quite what everybody’s reading into this well he wasn’t quite on the X like he’s typically where there’s a lot of outrage from the members about the conduct of the FBI I think there’s a lot of attention really being thrown at the secret service at this point I think he at that point gave a little bit of an exhale felt like there was a little bit of a hold my beer from the Secret Service and he could give a little bit more here the expectations here because the facts and circumstances there’s a great demand for them he’s going to be willing to give a little bit here but by and large Christopher Ray has just done the exact same thing all the time and I think it’s derivative of one he’s a politically partisan guy but secondly he’s not an outcomes guy the folks on this panel the American people were outcome driven we wanted see results we want to see an effective investigation actually transpire where we get all the answers he doesn’t see that as success he’s about the process process itself is Success he’s going to come up there and say look we have all these tools that you gave us and we’re using them all look at all the resources we brought to bear you gave us 12 billion why don’t you give us 13 billion next year you touched on it a little bit right there but how do you describe Christopher Ray well I think that you one thing you have to know about Christopher Ray is that he made 9.2 Mill million dollar a year before he was brought in as the FBI director and he gave that up for a $200,000 a year job for a 10-y year appointment where he’d have to live apart from his family I’ve always sort of associated that with that’s a 10year appointment $9 million sacrifice annually 90 million do that’s what his sacrifice was for the cause and the cause was bringing cultural Marxism to its full fruition within the FBI you can see it in the hiring standards has been exposed by the Judiciary Committee and then Miranda deine reported on the New York Post and other folks that I have anecdotally who have communicated with me their concerns where they’re bringing in people at this point who are 50 lbs overweight describing themselves as woke and then most recently you had somebody hired by the Washington field office who is an actual heroin addict because they’re just willing to follow orders they know that being an FBI agent is something that they can get paid really well they can have all the esteem and they just have to do what they’re told and Christopher Ray has overseen that w w ification that we’ve seen uh it’s described to us over the last few years particularly Steve uh By the Way Love Russ vote and the center and the work you guys are doing it’s great stuff uh people should check that out um my question is uh very simple how do we get out of this I mean it doesn’t seem to me from what you’re saying and I agree with much of it uh that there’s much we can hope for when it comes to getting down to the truth of this in the FBI I mean do you think this is a lost cause at this point well the agency itself I think is a lost cause because the reforms that are necessary to bring it back from the brink are so drastic that you can do a complete reboot or the massive reform six of one half dozen of the other there’s major reforms that need to be institutionally given out there they need to drastically reduce its footprint from a headquarter standpoint one in five people who work for the FBI work in Washington DC they need to get rid of the intelligence brand entirely get back to actually doing criminal investigations do not concern themselves with intelligence gathering on the American people but I think honestly the best thing that we could do for for the FBI to make it an effective and objective Force for good would be to take the guns away remove the teeth from the attack dog the origin of the FBI was an unarmed investigative agency it can return to that and it can do what Christopher Ray says that it is always intending to do and that is Aid local law enforcement Aid the local sheriffs the police Chiefs in the cases that they need to address for their communities and their constituencies who they are most responsive to Steve you posted on X that little birdies were telling you that there is more concern about right-wing violence as a response to Donald Trump’s assassination attempt than the attack itself within the IC community and that’s something that Congress should probably look into you wrote can you expand on that a little well the mission creep that has set in since 911 when the FBI received its National Security responsibilities to be the century on the wall and the mission creep that’s set in now we’ve evolved from homegrown violent extremism who were Muslim Americans to domestic violent extremists who were moms going to school board meetings and people flying the gadston or the bsy Ross flag outside their house and now we have the latest iteration which is called the anti-government anti-authority violent extremist agave and the FBI and Department of Homeland Security have actually authored a strategic assessment describing what in aave is and that is a profile of someone who has a perception of government overreach or negligence that is all the Playbook Remains the Same the FBI identifies a vulnerable person and they ENT trap them they groom them they use Undercovers they use informants and they get them to do something that they do not have the proclivity the means or the opportunity to even do just get them to agree to do it and then they come swooping in because the FBI is a bureaucracy they’re driven by growing their budgets and expanding their programs expanding their power the victim of their entrapments has changed it’s gone from the Muslim American to now the right-wing extremist because there are political reasons for that but they are all too happy to turn their guns on whoever they’re directed to and that’s been the most recent iteration that we’ve seen under the National Security Banner director Ray was clearly disingenuous about an early answer yesterday in this uh hearing when he was asked about whether the hiring standards had been lowered for new incoming agents uh can you speak to that well that’s been recently revealed by the house Judiciary Committee they actually did a report on this the fact is that they’ve reduced the fitness standards when I went through in 2014 we had to pass the fitness test before we even arrive to Quantico to do the new agent training that’s not no longer the case you just have to pass it by the end of the training there so they’re allowing people to arrive they’re investing quite a bit of money in them to bring them to the field and if they’re not able to do that they’re going to be more inclined to maybe uh hit the little timer on the 300 meter sprint a little bit later to ensure that they get the time to pass muster and a lot of the hiring that’s gone on they’re trying to hit their diversity quotas here’s another thing the FBI has nine diversity advisory committees that report directly to the FBI director they’re all in on the Dei they’re all in on the 30×30 initiative that’s ensuring 30% women in policing by the year 2030 and that’s going to fundamentally change the culture of law enforcement Steve given what you’re saying how are we going to get to the bottom of what actually happened uh on that fateful Saturday and this assassination attempt well I would encourage enage Congress the house which is controlled by the Republicans to use us as a wedge issue in the upcoming budget fight they need to authorize an independent parallel investigation and assure that it’s going to be fully transparent this shooter has no expectation of privacy the nature of this crime that has affected the lives of every single American necessitates that a full and transparent investigation happens where we have daily briefings of what goes on I do not trust anyone who works with the FBI to carry forward a full and effective investigation there are other people out there effective investigators experienced investigators people who didn’t just go to 16 weeks of training at Quantico who can carry this forward I would trust them I would even trust the Pennsylvania State Police to get involved at this point there needs to be a parallel investigation to push the FBI to match their ability against someone else and I think when that comes to pass we’re going to see that the FBI comes up short
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Video Duration: 00:10:27
