Donald Trump was only in the second week of his second term when his revenge tour arrived at the FBI’s headquarters: The Republican president and his allies ousted senior bureau officials, including the assistant director in charge of the FBI Washington Field Office. Several days later, Trump told the public that he intended to fire even more FBI personnel, accusing agents without evidence of being “corrupt.”
It was an early reminder that Trump is determined not just to fundamentally change the bureau, but also to destabilize federal law enforcement.
A month later, another shoe fell. NBC News reported:
The head of the FBI’s New York field office was forced out Monday, a month after he urged his employees to “dig in” after the Trump administration removed senior FBI leaders and requested the names of all agents who worked on Jan. 6 cases, five sources familiar with the matter told NBC News. In an email to FBI staff members in New York on Monday, James Dennehy confirmed that he had been ordered to leave.
The backstory on this makes the developments all the more striking.
In early February, acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove — a former Trump defense attorney rewarded with a powerful position in the Justice Department — made an outrageous request: Bove wanted the FBI to turn over the names of every employee who worked on Jan. 6 cases. Given the number of investigations into alleged and convicted Jan. 6 criminals, such a list would’ve been enormous.
Just as importantly, it also raised the prospect of thousands of firings across the rank-and-file FBI staff, because assorted agents had the audacity to do their jobs in the wake of insurrectionist attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Dennehy balked.
“Today, we find ourselves in the middle of a battle of our own as good people are being walked out of the FBI,” Dennehy wrote in an email to his staff after receiving Bove’s demand. “And others are being targeted because they did their jobs in accordance with the law and FBI policy.”
He added, “Time for me to dig in.”
In other words, Dennehy, confronted with an apparent abuse, took a stand in support of FBI agents who had done nothing wrong. NBC News’ report noted, “It is widely believed inside the FBI that the resistance by Dennehy — along with the acting director, Brian Driscoll, and the acting deputy director, Rob Kissane — prevented a mass firing of thousands of FBI officials who worked on the Jan. 6 cases.”
A month after writing that email, Dennehy, a Marine Corps veteran who joined the bureau after the Sept. 11 attacks, was told that he could either resign or be fired.
“Dennehy’s removal is likely to reignite fears of mass retaliation,” NBC News’ report added. That seems like a safe bet.
