The U.S. federal law enforcement raid last week at the elections office of Fulton county, Georgia, was controversial from the start. The county, which includes Atlanta, has been a primary target of President Donald Trump’s false claims of widespread fraud in the 2020 elections. |
So when FBI agents on Jan. 28 executed a search warrant and seized some 700 boxes of documents, including 2020 ballots and voter data, from the county, it set off alarm bells among election experts and pro-democracy advocates—particularly in light of Trump’s recent statements that he thinks the federal government should “take over” elections in Democratic-led areas. The U.S. Constitution explicitly authorizes states to administer federal elections. |
Things took an even more scandalous turn, however, when photos emerged of Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s director of national intelligence, at the scene of the FBI raid. This prompted questions from lawmakers and legal analysts, as Gabbard’s role is to coordinate and oversee the work of the U.S. intelligence community, not to oversee domestic law enforcement matters. |
What followed was a string of confusing and at times conflicting explanations from Trump administration officials. |
The day after the raid, Trump said in response to questions about Gabbard’s presence that she was “working very hard on trying to keep the election safe.” But Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche denied Gabbard was part of the investigation, saying she “happened to be present in Atlanta” and that “she wasn’t at the search; she was in the area where the search took place.” |
Then, on Monday, The New York Times reported that Gabbard arranged for Trump to have a call with frontline agents involved in the seizure of documents immediately afterward, during which the president directly posed questions to the investigators. While the Times’ sources said Trump did not give any directives to the agents during the brief call, it is nonetheless highly unusual, to say the least, for a president to have such direct involvement in a law enforcement matter—particularly one as politically sensitive as this. |
“It is extremely dangerous to our democracy and a shocking abandonment of years of sound policy for the president to be directly involved in the conduct of domestic criminal investigations, especially one that seeks to redress his personal grievances and to make the director of national intelligence an instrument of his political will,” David Laufman, a former senior DoJ official in both Republican and Democratic administrations, told the Times. |
In response to the Times’ revelations, Blanche downplayed Trump’s involvement, telling Fox News that “the president talks to law enforcement all week long.” And for her part, Gabbard tried to clear things up in a letter to members of Congress that she released publicly Monday night, in which she argued that ensuring the integrity of U.S. elections was consistent with her role and that her presence at the Fulton county raid was “requested by the president.” She also denied that Trump asked any questions during his call with investigators. |
As all of this was unfolding, The Wall Street Journal reported on the existence of a highly sensitive whistleblower complaint against Gabbard. The whistleblower had filed the complaint last May and was seeking guidance from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence on how to securely transmit it to Congress, in accordance with the law, but the whistleblower’s attorney claimed the process was being stalled. |
The contents of the whistleblower report were briefed to a group of senior lawmakers this week, though reportedly with significant portions redacted due to claims of executive privilege. That suggests the allegations could involve the White House. A government watchdog has said the whistleblower complaint involves failure to report a crime to the Justice Department and the improper withholding of a classified intelligence report. |
It is unclear whether the whistleblower complaint is related to Gabbard’s involvement in investigating the 2020 election. But what we already know is concerning on its face. |
There are important limits on the kinds of activities intelligence agencies can undertake inside the United States. That distinction between foreign and domestic intelligence activities was established in the mid-1970s in response to revelations of abuses committed by the FBI, CIA and NSA, revealed by a Senate investigative committee led by Sen. Frank Church. |
“If you convince people that the intelligence community is playing political games domestically, it’s bad,” one former senior counterintelligence official told CNN. “I don’t think anyone wants a reprise of the kind of stuff the Church Committee uncovered.” |
As Church himself understood, a president using the capabilities of the country’s intelligence services for political purposes would severely undermine America’s democracy. But even Church may not have imagined the possibility that a president would use his intelligence agencies as part of a bid to call into question the results of a free and fair election. |
“I know the capacity that is there to make tyranny total in America, and we must see to it that this agency and all agencies that possess this technology operate within the law and under proper supervision so that we never cross over that abyss,” Church said on an episode of “Meet the Press” in 1975. “That is the abyss from which there is no return.” |