GOP Senators: Garland Has ‘Given Life to the Idea Dissidents Are Synonymous with Terrorists’

A letter signed by the 11 Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee demanded that Attorney General Merrick Garland withdraw his October 4 memo ordering the FBI to investigate parents who speak out at school board meetings against leftist classroom indoctrination, particularly of the racist ideology known as Critical Race Theory.

“Are concerned parents domestic terrorists or not?” the letter begins. “No arm of the government, including the offices under your command, may be used to chill criticism of local government officials. By involving the FBI’s Counterterrorism Division in this matter, that is exactly what you have done.”

Describing school officials as persons who “just happen to be a major constituency of the political party that currently controls the White House and the Department of Justice,” the senators write that the use of counterterrorism tools against parents is the federal government’s attempt to flex its “muscle in [the] marketplace of ideas.”

“Make no mistake about it — there are those who would be perfectly happy with the federal government, now including the FBI’s Counterterrorism Division, scaring people out of criticizing local school boards,” the letter continues. “A big part of this problem, which you either do not understand or are complicit in, is that too many people nowadays equate ideas they do not like with violence.”

“You have given life to the idea that dissidents are synonymous with terrorists,” the senators concluded. “This is a common tactic of third-world dictatorships, but it should never be FBI practice.”

Merrick Garland

5 Known Connections

FBI Whistleblower Reveals That the Bureau Created a “Threat Tag” to Track Alleged Harassment of Education Officials

On November 16, 2021, Fox News reported that an October 20 internal email from the FBI’s criminal and counterterrorism divisions — as part of the agency’s implementation of Garland’s October 4 memo citing an increase in harassment of education officials — instructed agents to apply the threat tag “EDUOFFICIALS” to all probes of threats allegedly directed at school board officials, teachers and staff. “The purpose of the threat tag is to help scope this threat on a national level, and provide an opportunity for comprehensive analysis of the threat picture for effective engagement with law enforcement partners at all levels,” said the email. It also instructed FBI agents to try to determine: (a) what may have been the motivation behind the criminal activity being investigated, and (b) whether that activity violated any federal laws.

Reacting to news of the FBI threat tags, Republican Rep. Jim Jordan tweeted on November 16: “Merrick Garland testified that the FBI wasn’t targeting parents. We now know the FBI is ‘tagging’ parents they consider threatening. The Attorney General has some explaining to do.” In a similar vein, Republican Senator Josh Hawley tweeted: “If this is accurate, parents are getting the domestic-terrorist treatment after all.”

To learn more about Merrick Garland, click here.

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