Ohio Republican and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan described the tags as a weaponization “pattern.”
QUICK FACTS:
- The Federal Bureau of Investigation linked parents of schoolchildren, pro-life activists, and Catholics attending Latin Mass with “threat tags,” designating them as potential domestic terrorist threats.
- It was discovered in 2021 that American parents were given threat tags as the FBI conducted investigations into protests against school boards pushing woke ideologies onto children.
- A leaked and since retracted FBI internal document suggested Catholics who attend Latin Mass present risks of extremist violence due to a “growing interest in Catholic traditionalism by some racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists,” according to America Magazine.
- House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) said of the threat tags on the podcast John Solomon Reports, “If it’s [targeting] parents, that’s one thing. Traditional Catholics — okay, well, that’s a concern too. But when it gets to be three, which is what we learned from a whistleblower when he said they were targeting pro-lifers, now we see a pattern, right?”
- “So it’s parents, traditional Catholics, pro-lifers — all are wrong. Now it’s a pattern,” Jordan added.
- Jordan’s statement comes as FBI whistleblower Garret O’Boyle revealed to Congressional leaders that the bureau used the threat tag “THREATSTOSCOTUS2022″ to deem pro-life individuals as threats to Supreme Court Justices’ safety following the overturn of Roe v. Wade.
- “When this threat tag came out, it was like, why are you focusing on pro-life people,” said O’Boyle. “It’s pro-choice people who are the ones protesting or otherwise threatening violence in front of Supreme Court justices’ houses.”
REPUBLICAN HOUSE TO USE “POWER OF THE PURSE” AGAINST FBI:
- Rep. Jordan told Fox News’s “Sunday Morning Futures” host Maria Bartiromo that the Republican House plans to use its Constitutional spending power, the so-called “power of the purse,” to limit federal funds given to the FBI.
- “We’re going to look to propose legislation, and in the end, the real power of Congress, the real power of the legislative branch, is the power of the purse,” Jordan said.
- “And we’re going to have to use that both on this issue where we think the government’s been targeting the very people it’s supposed to serve. But also, frankly, on the border—I think we’re going to have to look at ways to use the appropriation process to deal with the border situation,” he continued.
- The Ohio representative added that the politicization of the FBI is “egregious behavior.”
BACKGROUND:
- Attorney General Merrick Garland said during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing that the Department of Justice (DOJ) prosecuted more pro-life demonstrators because they acted “during the daylight,” whereas those who attacked pregnancy centers are “clever and are doing it in secret.”
- Utah Senator Mike Lee (R) questioned the “disparity” of charges between pro-life and abortion activists, asking Garland, “So how do you explain this disparity by reference to anything other than politicization of what’s happening there?”
- Garland claimed that there are “many more prosecutions with respect to blocking of the abortion centers,” but that is due to “photography at the time,” the actions being taken “during the daylight,” and witnesses “seeing the person who did it.”
