NBC host Chuck Todd made a startling admission on Sunday’s “Meet the Press” concerning the embattled FBI. He asserted that the Durham Report exposing the agency’s misdeeds in the Russian collusion hoax spawned the need for an investigation.
In fact, he recalled the infamous Church Committee of the 1970s as an example of the examination that needs to be conducted into Washington’s intelligence community.
Todd noted that conservative media outlets called the report a “bombshell” and expressed that the investigation into former President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign was a “soft coup.”
This view was also true of Republican leadership. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) stated loudly on Sunday that the report showed “the FBI became a political weapon. They wanted to get Trump. They didn’t care how they did it.”
NBC's Chuck Todd on Durham report fallout: "It feels like we're in the moment that we need a real Church Committee…like when the J. Edgar Hoover FBI clearly was no longer helping the American people, there was a moment — this feels like we might be in one of those moments…" pic.twitter.com/ciRRkLMbfY
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Graham accused the bureau of discarding the rule of law simply to get a desired outcome. And though they clearly occupy different ends of the political spectrum, Todd agreed with Graham’s observations of many of Special Counsel John Durham’s findings about the probe.
The four-year Durham investigation concluded that the FBI’s work suffered greatly from “confirmation bias.”
Evidence and conclusions that fit the predetermined narrative were absorbed and validated. Meanwhile, those that did not were “discounted or willfully ignored.”
Todd declared that it was clearly not the bureau’s finest hour. Then-director James Comey, according to the host, contributed greatly to the confirmation bias exhibited by the agency.
This obvious infraction and tilting of the investigation, the NBC mouthpiece asserted, damaged trust in the FBI from both the left and right. While conservatives are loudest in their criticisms, even Democrats are not blind to the obvious political angle taken by the agency.
Todd added that the time has arrived when “we need a real Church Committee. This is a moment like when the J. Edgar Hoover FBI clearly was no longer helping the American people. There was a moment. This feels like we might be in one of those moments.”
The FBI is not beyond salvaging, but it must be rescued from the politicization and weaponization it has undergone under Democratic leadership. Above all else, the nation’s powerful investigative agencies must be beyond reproach and even-handed in their actions.
