A whistleblower has revealed that the FBI investigated concerned parents after Attorney General Merrick Garland directed the agency to combat “threats of violence” against school board administrators last year.
In October of 2021, Merrick Garland issued a memorandum that expressed concern about a “disturbing spike in harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence against school administrators, board members, teachers, and staff who participate in the vital work of running our nation’s public schools.”
“Threats against public servants are not only illegal, they run counter to our nation’s core values,” Garland wrote at the time. “Those who dedicate their time and energy to ensuring that our children receive a proper education in a safe environment deserve to be able to do their work without fear for their safety.”
To combat this alleged problem, Garland announced a 30-day plan that would have the FBI working with U.S attorneys across the country to discuss “strategies for addressing threats against school administrators, board members, teachers, and staff, and will open dedicated lines of communication for threat reporting, assessment, and response.”
The memorandum arrived less than a week after leaders of the National School Boards Association wrote President Joe Biden a letter claiming that “many public school officials are also facing physical threats because of propaganda purporting the false inclusion of critical race theory within classroom instruction and curricula.”
“This propaganda continues despite the fact that critical race theory is not taught in public schools and remains a complex law school and graduate school subject well beyond the scope of a K-12 class,” the letter emphasized.
In the months that followed, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) conducted an investigation into Garland’s directive and the Biden administration’s involvement in the FBI’s conduct and uncovered some disturbing facts. In a letter issued to Merrick Garland on Wednesday, the two congressmen claimed that a whistleblower brought forward evidence alleging that the FBI “labeled at least dozens of investigations into parents with a threat tag created by” the agency’s counterterrorism division “to assess and track investigations related to school boards.”
“These cases include investigations into parents upset about mask mandates and state elected officials who publicly voiced opposition to vaccine mandates. These investigations into concerned parents are the direct result of, and would not have occurred but for, your directive to federal law enforcement to target these categories of people,” the letter said.
The whistleblowers reportedly claimed that the FBI opened investigations with the threat tag all over the country. Of the examples cited, one FBI investigation centered on a mom flagged by the National Threat Operations Center snitch-line, who was described as a “right-wing” member of the group “Moms for Liberty.” The investigation sparked after she allegedly told a local school board “we are coming for you.” The FBI later determined that the mother was no threat and that her rhetoric referred to a peaceful transfer of power through school board elections.
Another investigation centered on a dad who “fit the profile of an insurrectionist” because he “rails against the government” and owned lots of guns.
While the letter noted how the FBI ulimtately dismissed these investigations, the two congressman were still troubled by the fact precious law enforcement resources were used to probe parents that were merely exercising their First Amendment right.
Whistleblowers: The FBI has labeled dozens of investigations into parents with a threat tag created by the FBI’s Counterterrorism Division pic.twitter.com/STlLdrfbMz
— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) May 11, 2022
