On Sept. 16, FBI Director Kash Patel sat for a hearing with the Senate Judiciary Committee, during which Democrats on the committee pushed, among other things, the accusation that Bureau leadership was on a mission of revenge against personnel who had previously investigated President Donald Trump. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA), who chairs the committee, had other ideas. He reminded those present of Arctic Frost, an investigation that started in April 2022 targeting Trump that turned into a dragnet, thrown over, essentially, the entire Republican movement.
The Arctic Frost investigation was opened to look into a supposed vast conspiracy to overturn the official result of the 2020 presidential election. It was initiated by Timothy Thibault, a then-FBI Assistant Special Agent in Charge, and it became the basis of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s prosecution of Trump. Thibault was later compelled to resign from the FBI when Grassley exposed the anti-Trump and anti-Republican political biases expressed in Thibault’s social media activities.
Grassley Talks Arctic Frost
In his prepared opening remarks, Grassley, who on the day of the hearing released documents related to Arctic Frost, said, “These new records show that Arctic Frost was much broader than just an electoral matter. The case was expanded to Republican organizations.” He continued, “Some examples of the groups the [former Director Christopher] Wray FBI sought to place under political investigation included the Republican National Committee, Republican Attorneys General Association and Trump political groups. In total, 92 Republican targets, including Republican groups and Republican-linked individuals, were placed under the investigative scope of Arctic Frost.”
Just days after the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, Grassley pointed out, “On that political list was one of Charlie Kirk’s groups, Turning Point USA.”
In a statement provided to Fox News Digital, Republican Attorneys General Association Director Adam Piper said, "For years, the deep state, unelected Biden bureaucrats — including the FBI — used lawfare to target Republican AGs and many other close friends because we were allies of Donald Trump."
The committee chair knew what the Democrat members of the Judiciary Committee had in store for Director Patel – that they were going to berate him for supposedly purging the FBI of employees who worked on investigations aimed at President Trump, his associates and supporters, and conservative-aligned organizations. To pre-empt this, Grassley also noted in his opening remarks:
“Since the Trump administration took power, many FBI agents have been removed. The removals included agents and prosecutors who became partisan weapons that lost their way, and I’ve made records public to prove it. And many of my whistleblowers were aggressively retaliated against by some FBI agents who were fired. One FBI whistleblower publicly said of these terminations: ‘Ensuring that they no longer work at the FBI isn’t retribution, it's responsible leadership.’”
Kash Patel Breaks the Mold
Notable in the Patel hearing was the director’s candor. The only questions he refused to answer were those directly related to ongoing investigations. Otherwise, the FBI director gave straight and somewhat detailed answers to both Republican and Democrat senators – when the latter allowed him to answer without cutting him off.
This is in stark contrast to the days of former FBI Directors James Comey and Christopher Wray, who hardly ever provided direct answers during hearings.
Democrat leadership frequently claims Trump has “weaponized” the federal government. Yet, even while he ran for president for the first time – and even while he sat in the Oval Office – the FBI was working feverishly to bring him down, first with Crossfire Hurricane and then assisting Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation. When Trump left office, the Bureau targeted him again, along with many other Republicans, via Arctic Frost.
Then there are all the other investigations, indictments, arrests – the almost 1,000 Jan. 6 protesters thrown in jail, and the religious organizations and even parents singled out by Joe Biden’s Department of Justice.
Today, the FBI is the least politically weaponized it has been perhaps since 2008. And if the Bureau and the DOJ are investigating some of the people who willingly became a part of the previous political machinations, that’s not revenge or retribution; that’s corrective action, accountability, and justice.
