The standoff over the memo is striking in that the president appeared to unilaterally reject the advice of his own top officials.
WASHINGTON — By the time Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and FBI Director Christopher Wray arrived Monday at the White House to make a final appeal to block the release of a classified memo alleging government surveillance abuses, a decision already had been made.
At the White House, there was no consideration of altering a Republican-led House committee’s vote along party lines earlier in the week to disclose a document accusing the government of improperly tracking a former Trump campaign adviser. An official familiar with the meeting who was not authorized to speak publicly about internal discussions said the pressure to release the document was just too great for the FBI and Justice Department leaders too great to overcome.
President Trump has for months railed against federal law enforcement and the intelligence community, blaming them for shadowing his year in office with a probe he frequently denounces as a « witch hunt » and a « hoax. »
But the standoff over a secret memo written by at the direction of House Intelligence Committee chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif., is striking in that the president of the United States appeared to unilaterally reject the advice of his own top officials, despite their separate warnings. In an unusual public statement Wednesday, the FBI said it had « grave concerns » for the document’s public release.
Short of the upheaval triggered by President Nixon’s orders to fire Watergate special prosecutor Archibald Cox, analysts say there may be no precedent for the forces that have now aligned against the FBI and Justice. Republicans in the House are appear to be siding with Trump’s questions into the credibility of the federal investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election – and raising aloud extraordinary public doubts about the institutional integrity of all federal law enforcement.
With even House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., calling to « cleanse » the FBI by releasing the memo, Rosenstein and Wray have been pushed into near-untenable positions by Trump who believes the memo offers evidence that the Russia inquiry – and specifically the FBI – is biased against him.
« I have never seen anything like this, » said William Esposito, a former FBI deputy director. « There was a time when the FBI, Justice Department and the White House could have disagreements that were legitimate disagreements. Now, it seems that every disagreement results in a constitutional crisis. The whole thing is just a mess. »
The memo dispute is only the latest in a series of clashes involving the Trump White House, Justice Department and the FBI.
Last year, Trump abruptly dismissed his FBI chief James Comey for his handling of the Russia inquiry. (Now, Wray, as Trump’s hand-picked successor, is facing his first public confrontation with the president.) And Trump publicly shamed Attorney General Jeff Sessions throughout the summer for his decision to recuse himself from the Russia case because of his prior contacts with Russia Ambassador Sergey Kislyak – a decision that led Rosenstein to oversee the special counsel probe into Russia’s election interference.
« With Congress – specifically the Republican leadership – now jumping in, it takes this confrontation to a different level, » said Tom Fuentes, a former FBI assistant director. « It’s a dangerous time. »
It’s not the first.
When lawmakers sought to break up the FBI for its failings to thwart the 9/11 attacks, then-FBI Director Mueller and Attorney General John Ashcroft ultimately prevailed.
More recently, the agency and Justice were thrust into turmoil following then-Director Comey’s abrupt decision to re-open the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server in the days before the 2016 election, prompting charges of political interference.
Then there was the famously icy distance that distinguished President Bill Clinton’s relationship with FBI Director Louis Freeh and Attorney General Janet Reno.
Perhaps the closest comparison to the current Trump-Justice face-off, Fuentes said, was an infamous 2004 clash in which Bush administration Chief of Staff Andrew Card and White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales pressed Ashcroft to renew a controversial domestic surveillance program, as the attorney general lay critically ill in a Washington hospital.
The episode featured a familiar cast of characters, including then-Deputy Attorney General Comey and former FBI Director Mueller, who both threatened to resign if the White House officials continued to press their case.
« The protest then involved what Comey and Mueller believed to be a threat posed by the program to the public in general, » Fuentes said. « In this case, the White House appears to be acting to protect the president. What’s at stake here is an attempt to use the national security apparatus of the United States for political purposes. »
For the 109-year-old FBI, whose work has long-occupied a revered status across the government, there now appear to be few allies with any authority.
The agency’s diminished standing, analysts said, has been accelerated by the bureau’s politically-charged involvement in the Clinton email investigation and recent disclosures that FBI agents working on the Clinton and Russia investigations professed personal animus against Trump.
Ryan, the House speaker, on Thursday defended the disclosure of the memo as a legitimate act of congressional oversight of government agencies. The House intelligence panel led by Nunes, a member of Trump’s transition team, voted to release the document Monday, triggering its review by the White House.
« The process is exactly what it should have been, » Ryan said. “What concerns me is if we are violating American civil liberties. »Ryan maintained that the move for public disclosure of the memo was not aimed as « an indictment » against the FBI, Wray or Rosenstein – or Mueller.
« This is about us holding the system accountable and reviewing whether or not…abuses occurred, » he said.
For the FBI, the clash could not come at a worse time. Wray — only five months on the job — has had little time to forge key relationships in Congress that often benefited his predecessors, even if it only bought them time to face down their own crises of confidence.
