Christopher Wray is getting away with doing a lousy job

[LetMyPeopleVote]

Wray has been a bad FBI head

Link to tweet

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/03/02/christopher-wray-failure/

The MAGA right thinks FBI Director Christopher A. Wray is some sort of patsy for Democrats. But the problem is not that Wray, a Trump appointee, is showing favoritism to a Democratic administration. It’s that he is not doing his job when it comes to threats from right-wing authoritarianism.

Don’t take my word for it. The Government Accountability Office issued a report this week concerning the performance of multiple agencies and police units regarding the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection. Among its findings: The FBI “did not consistently follow agency policies or procedures for processing tips or potential threats because they did not have controls to ensure compliance with policies.”

The extent to which the FBI was aware of credible threats but did not prepare is breathtaking:

In the weeks preceding the January 6 attack on the Capitol, the FBI obtained information across other sources indicating potential threats. Through human source reporting, investigations, and observed activity, the FBI identified the increasing threat of violence at high profile special events, such as the 2020 election and 2021 presidential inauguration. FBI officials we spoke with said that from December 29, 2020, through January 6, 2021, they tracked domestic terrorism subjects that were traveling to Washington, D.C., and developed reports related to January 6 events. As of January 6, 2021, FBI officials noted that the Washington Field Office was tracking 18 domestic terrorism subjects as potential travelers to the D.C. area.
Other information came directly from social media platforms. From October 1, 2020, through January 5, 2021, officials from the FBI we spoke with said they obtained and reviewed 73 potential domestic terrorism related referrals from one social media platform, and obtained one referral on January 4, 2021, related to potential violence in Washington, D.C. on January 6. In addition, the FBI received information from another social media platform from late November 2020 through January 6, 2021, regarding potential violence at January 6 events.

Once the FBI had that information, it did not act upon it with the urgency required. “FBI personnel did not follow policies for processing some tips, resulting in them not being developed into reports that could have been shared with partners. Specifically, the FBI did not process all relevant information related to potential violence on January 6.”.....

Putting the incidents together — the Jan. 6 debacle, the failure to collect domestic terrorism data and the FBI’s undue resistance to enforcing a subpoena (that ultimately turned up a raft of documents not previously disclosed) — one is left wondering why the FBI seems disinclined to stand up to right-wing authoritarian movements and figures. Whatever the reason, the pattern reveals an unmistakable lack of effective leadership. And that in turn raises the question: Why is Wray still there?

[republianmushroom]

1. agree with poster.

[jalan48]

2. Who's Wray's boss?

[ancianita]

7. Garland. And Biden. They both need to have a meeting about him.

But given their respect for each other's independent roles, they probably won't. But one of them should initiate a request for his resignation.

[jalan48]

8. After what transpired on January 6th I'm surprised he didn't step down or was removed

immediately. Sending a clear message about the coup attempt would seem to have been an appropriate action from the get go.

[ancianita]

9. I'm thinking the delay was because he knew facts that hadn't yet come out. But now that they have...

Wray has got to go.

[jalan48]

10. i agree.

[ancianita]

18. Right on. AND it was Wray himself who told Congress that domestic terrorism was our greatest

domestic security threat! If he was in denial about pro-Trump whites not attacking, given the intel he had, that makes him a passive aggressive political, racist asshole not fit to lead. And to think he was trained years before under Director Mueller.

[FM123]

3. I too ask that question

"Why is Wray still there?"

[Boomerproud]

4. Get rid of him Joe.

Nt

[Baitball Blogger]

5. Truth.

[ancianita]

6. Indeed, he is lousy, considering that he got trained up under FBI Director Robert Mueller. nt

[Tetrachloride]

11. an oldie but goodie: The Ukraine government would have indicted by now

[erronis]

13. From one of the comments in the WaPo's article:

Christopher Wray was Chris Christie's defense attorney in the Bridge Gate debacle and succeeded in keeping Christie out of jail.

Wray is the Republican that Drumpf trusted to run the FBI while the Counter Intelligence Division was investigating him and his Russian connections after he fired Comey.

While there is no indication that Wray worked on this file Wray's law firm — King & Spalding — represented Rosneft and Gazprom, two of Russia’s largest state-controlled oil companies.

Rosneft was prominently mentioned in the now infamous 35-page dossier prepared by former British MI6 agent Christopher Steele. The dossier claims that the CEO of Rosneft, Igor Sechin, offered candidate Donald Trump, through Trump’s campaign advisor Carter Page, a 19% stake in the company in exchange for lifting U.S. sanctions on Russia. The dossier claims that the offer was made in July while Page was in Moscow.
In short Wray is a person Drumpf trusted to keep the FBI off his back and, if the credible reporting that a senior FBI agent pushed hard to keep the rest of the Justice Department from executing the search warrant to look for more top secret documents at Mar-a-Lardo, that hasn't changed even after Drumpf lost the election.

The FBI's failures in the period leading up to Jan. 6th are yet another indication that the Biden administration should have cleared out all the Drumpf appointees at the DOJ, Homeland Security, the Pentagon, the CIA, the EPA and every other sensitive role in government as the first order of business for the simple reason that Drumpf probably chose those particular people with corrupt intent just as he has always done in all his business affairs.

While Biden may not have liked the optics of purging the government of Drumpf appointees, and setting precedence for a Republican administration to do the same, no previous administration had ever appointed people to high office to oversee an attempt to overthrow democracy in a what turned out to be a failed coup.

[FakeNoose]

27. Exactly right - Bill Barr and Chris Wray were the one-two punch

... that set the stage for the January 6th coup attempt.

Barr saw it coming and backed away in time. But Wray is still in office, against all reasonable odds.

[JI7]

14. Who is he going to replace him with ?

[MichMan]

16. Lori Lightfoot is available.

She has experience as a Federal Prosecutor, US Attorney and with the Chicago Police Board

[meadowlander]

17. Peter Strzok or Sally Yates

[Eyeball_Kid]

22. I'm for Sally. n/t

[kacekwl]

24. Sally Yates is

way underused IMO.

[ancianita]

19. Andrew McCabe is available. He has acting director experience.

[LymphocyteLover]

21. Good thought-- he seems pretty reasonable from the interviews I've heard

[Kennah]

26. Andrew McCabe

[maxrandb]

30. I would replace him with Hillary Clinton

and would appoint her as "acting" effective immediately.

Heads would explode on the right, and you could get rid of all the MAGA FBI Agents. They'd be easy to identify by the veins throbbing on their foreheads.

[Eyeball_Kid]

20. Is it time to speculate?

Is Wray doing the Texas two-step with his fascist underlings because… HE’S ONE OF THEM?

Wray is sacrificing the agency’s integrity by giving a wink and a nod to his fascist staff. So… why is Garland tolerating this seditious nonsense? Who is Wray protecting?

[LymphocyteLover]

23. yes, he is

[FakeNoose]

25. Thank you Professor Tribe!