On FISA Abuses, IG Horowitz Lambasts ‘Failure’ of FBI’s ‘Entire Chain of Command’

During a raucous reelection rally on Tuesday night, President Trump ripped into the FBI over their misuse of the FISA warrant process to possibly spy on his 2016 campaign, citing a report from the Department of Justice’s Investigator General Michael Horowitz.

And while the “resistance”-minded Democrats are clinging to Horowitz’s insistence that there was no overt political bias involved in the decision-making process surrounding this controversy, (an undeniably positive result for the entire nation), they are having a hard time reconciling the rest of the report’s findings – namely that the FBI was rife with misdeeds and untruths during the remainder of that investigation.

Trump’s comments on that subject drew heavy criticism in the mainstream media, as they claimed the President was undermining the intelligence community by bashing The Bureau.

At the same time, the left will herald a quote possibly made by President John F. Kennedy regarding splintering the CIA into a thousand pieces.

The real problem here, however, is that Trump is completely right about the untoward actions of the FBI – even according to IG Horowitz himself.

Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz on Wednesday decried what he called “failure” by the entire “chain of command” involved in the FBI’s initial Trump-Russia investigation, saying they made “so many basic and fundamental errors” on “one of the most sensitive FBI investigations.”

Horowitz appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday to testify on his report on the origins of the FBI’s Russia investigation and alleged misconduct related to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). He also criticized FBI leadership for the “inaccuracies” and “omissions” in their FISA applications for former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page, among other things.

“We are deeply concerned that so many basic and fundamental errors were made by three separate, hand-picked investigative teams; on one of the most sensitive FBI investigations; after the matter had been briefed to the highest levels within the FBI; even though the information sought through the use of FISA authority related so closely to an ongoing presidential campaign; and even though those involved with the investigation knew that their actions were likely to be subjected to close scrutiny,” Horowitz said in his opening statement before the committee.

It gets worse:

“We believe this circumstance reflects a failure not just by those who prepared the FISA applications, but also by the managers and supervisors in the Crossfire Hurricane chain of command, including FBI senior officials who were briefed as the investigation progressed,” he said.

Yet again, we find ourselves working overtime in order to combat the spin of the mainstream media.