I’m going to start off by saying that domestic terrorism from either side of the ideological divide is wrong. There may come a time when the American people have to fight back against the forces of evil, but we’re not there yet.
In 2017, though, a Bernie Bro thought it was go time, and he thought the forces of evil were Republican members of Congress who were practicing for a good-natured baseball game against the Democrats.
He opened fire, wounding two before a police officer there put him down like a rabid dog. Rep. Steve Scalise was the worst injured, though he’s since recovered.
Since then, there’s been a lot of talk about that, particularly as some try to say right-wing violence is far more prevalent and one CNN “journalist” tried to claim he couldn’t think of an example of left-wing violence at all.
Yet it seems the FBI knew more than it was telling anyone about the shooter’s motives at the time.
The House Committee on Intelligence released a report Tuesday alleging the FBI withheld critical information confirming the political motivation of the 2017 Congressional baseball game shooting.
The report alleges the FBI, under then-Acting Director Andrew McCabe, “improperly classified” information on the investigation that would have undermined the official “suicide by cop” conclusion, while also failing to interview key witnesses and victims. The FBI was reportedly in possession of evidence that the shooter, James Hodgkinson, was a far-left extremist that premeditated the attack two months before, naming specific Republican targets in a handwritten note before opening fire on GOP congressmen and staffers at a baseball practice in Alexandria, Virginia.
Moreover, Hodgkinson made hostile phone calls to congressmen regarding the Republican party, as well as sending “angry” letters to multiple newspapers, the report found. The Daily Caller was the first to report that Hodgkinson had a list of names of GOP lawmakers in his pocket at the time of the shooting and that he died at a nearby hospital shortly after the shootout concluded.
“Unfortunately, this report confirms that under previous FBI leadership, the Bureau completely botched the investigation into this politically motivated attack which threatened the lives of numerous Republican Members of Congress, staff, and bystanders,” Committee Chairman Rick Crawford said in a statement Tuesday. “It is unacceptable and alarming that the FBI would approach any investigation within its purview with this complete disregard and lack of investigative integrity.”
The FBI only released evidence that supported the “suicide by cop” theory and classified everything else, thus covering up the shooter’s true motivations.
Still, a lot of people were unconvinced, if for no other reason than there were plenty of other places and opportunities for someone wanting to have a police officer take their life than waiting for a Republican congressional baseball practice.
That decision alone suggests there might have been more to the story, so a lot of people never really bought the official explanation.
Now, it turns out their skepticism was warranted.
Why does this matter?
This is the same FBI that conducts background checks on us when we try to buy a firearm. It’s part of the same Department of Justice that runs the ATF, which investigates our favorite gun stores. This is the FBI that President Donald Trump and other Republicans have claimed was weaponized against the political right in the United States of America, which many on the other side of the aisle called a conspiracy theory.
It wasn’t.
We’re expected to trust our federal government. Gun control advocates tell us we should relegate our personal defense to law enforcement in general, but that includes the FBI to some degree.
If we can’t trust the FBI to tell the truth about a would-be assassin, how can we trust them on literally anything else?
Read the full article here
