A Department of Justice watchdog report on the FBI’s operations during the January 6 attack at the U.S. Capitol vindicates Donald Trump’s allies continued suggestion the agency had a hand in the chaos, according to Senator Mike Lee — even though the report found “no evidence” undercover agents were there.
“Now it appears we weren’t so crazy after all,” the Republican senator told Fox News’s Sunday Morning Futures. “We had perfectly legitimate reasons to asked the questions.”
Liz Cheney called me a “nutball conspiracy theorist” for asking questions about FBI’s involvement on January 6th
— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) December 15, 2024
The DOJ Inspector General’s report confirmed that I had good reasons to ask these questions, which Christopher Wray repeatedly dodged https://t.co/IQC10Saf1z
Lee went on to baselessly suggest that Democrats may be hiding further information about the nature of January 6.
“What I do know is that after the Democrats lost the majority [in the House of Representatives], when the new majority came in and they started looking for documents, there was a bunch of stuff missing,” he said. “As far as who may have destroyed what, I don’t know.”
In the months after the 2020 election, Lee encourage the Trump team to hire attorneys and “set them loose” challenging the election results and urged state legislators to appoint illegitimate pro-Trump “alternative electors,” according to text messages obtained by CNN.
"Well, you know, had I known that my texts would be leaked to the public selectively, perhaps I would’ve said less in text messages,” Lee later said in defense.
Nearly four years later, the January 6 insurrection remains a political live wire.
More than 1,500 people have been charged for their involvement in January 6, the largest federal prosecution in U.S. history.
Trump himself has been charged with conspiracy and obstruction for his attempt to overturn the 2020 election results, though special counsel Jack Smith has moved to dismiss the case since Trump’s election, citing Justice Department guidelines against prosecuting a sitting president.
Trump has said he will grant pardons to large numbers of January 6 defendants, whom he has referred to as “patriots” and “hostages.”
Critics of the incoming administration worry that FBI nominee Kash Patel will use the agency to go after figures who scrutinized Trump on January 6 and other issues.
Patel, who has pushed a variety of conspiracy theories, has previously published an enemies list of figures, many of them Democrats, he says deserve prosecution. Patel has also said he wants to turn the FBI headquarters into a museum of the “deep state,” a shadowy cabal many on the right believe is running national affairs.
“Yes, we’re going to come after the people in the media who lied about American citizens, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections — we’re going to come after you,” he said on an episode of War Room last year. “Whether it’s criminally or civilly, we’ll figure that out.”
Democratic Senator Amy Klobuchar warned on CBS Face the Nation on Sunday that Patel is “on a revenge mission when we should be on a national security safety mission.”
“This is not the direction we need to go,” she said.
Senator Adam Schiff of California, who Trump regularly pilloried for his work on the January 6 investigation in Congress, warned this week that Patel’s “only qualification” is his “blind obedience” to Trump.
“The president can find other people who are loyal to him and to his interests, but who are also loyal to the rule of law,” Schiff told ABC. “Patel is not one of them.”
Others like Republican Senator Eric Schmitt argue the FBI is in need of change after years of controversy.
“That agency is in desperate need of reform,” he told ABC’s This Week. “Kash Patel is very qualified and I think he’s going to get the support in the Senate.”
