SHOCK MOMENT: Mike Garcia Tells FBI's Wray 'I Don't Trust You' To His Face—Then Wray Responds

7 months ago

At a House Appropriations Committee hearing last week, Rep. Mike Garcia (R-CA) questioned FBI Director Christopher Wray and slammed his tenure.

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Transcript

00:00Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

00:04Thank you, Director Wray.

00:05I'll be honest with you, and this pains me to say this, but I don't trust you.

00:11I don't think that this is necessarily a funding problem that we have for your agency as much

00:17as a leadership problem.

00:20Between the lack of transparency in hearings like this and in Intel hearings, your weaponization

00:25and politicization of issues and instruments of national security against innocent Americans

00:32and against institutions like churches, and the fact that you have held no one truly accountable

00:38for prior FISA abuses that we have all seen and recognized, I think you yourself have

00:42acknowledged that there's been abuses.

00:45Because of the fact that, as the FBI director, that you've stood relatively silent and passive

00:50about the biggest national security threat to our nation, that being our very open southern

00:56border, as the chairman has been discussing, I give very little credence in either your

01:02ability to do this job or, frankly, lead the brave agents below you.

01:06And I don't trust you to protect us, and that is a very difficult thing for me to say.

01:11It pains me to say that, because your job is critically important to the safety of this

01:16nation and American lives.

01:18And I think, because of your inability to lead and also shape the policies and the DOJ

01:23and at the White House, we are now in a more precarious position than we were, I would

01:28submit, than we were on September 10th of 2001.

01:33You yourself say in your written testimony that, over the past year, the threats facing

01:37our nation have escalated, the breadth of these threats and challenges are as complex

01:41as any time in our history, and the consequences of not responding and countering these threats

01:46have never been greater.

01:47These are your words.

01:49And we don't only pay you to warn us of a threat, which you have eloquently done here,

01:54although that's important and appreciated that you're warning us, but we also pay you

01:58to prevent and protect us from the threats.

02:02And you're in an agency, and I'm on committees where I'm your authorizer on the Intel Committee

02:08and I'm your appropriator here on the CJS Subcommittee on Appropriations, and I find

02:13it difficult to trust you to protect us, and any data or budget requests you bring

02:18to us as a result of that is, in my opinion, suspect.

02:21And in your nearly 20 pages of written testimony, you've mentioned the southern border only

02:27approximately four times, and even then you kind of gloss over it, and we now have 7 million

02:32people in our country, 350 people on the FBI terror watch list who have been apprehended,

02:39plus another 1.7 million known gotaways here within our borders as a result of your leadership's

02:47border policies.

02:48And I say your leadership and not your bosses because your bosses are the American people,

02:53right?

02:54Your customers are the American people.

02:56You work for them.

02:57You work for the people to protect them.

02:59So your leadership, the President of the United States, AG Garland, and Director of Homeland

03:05Security Mayorkas are literally intentionally putting the people that you work for, the

03:10average American citizen, into a clear and present danger situation that you yourself

03:15have acknowledged in your written testimony.

03:18So you've testified before the Intel Committee with the Worldwide Threats Briefs and other

03:24committees that there are giant red warning lights and warning signs and, you know, lots

03:29of flashing signs from a threat and terrorism assessment perspective.

03:34You know, and it's evident that you know and agree with this notion and that we should

03:38all be concerned, yet despite this, you have been unable to change the policies driven

03:44by your leadership, by the President, the AG, DHS Mayorkas, and so it's difficult, but

03:54in addition to being untrustworthy, you are also ineffective at a very important part

03:59of your job, which is shaping the policies that do affect national security, and that

04:05should be, the open border should be the biggest challenge that your administration is recognizing

04:11right now, and it unfortunately is not, and I think your biggest problem personally is

04:17that it's not just me that doesn't trust you, it's the American people that don't trust

04:21you right now as a result of that.

04:23Can I just get a simple yes or no response to this question?

04:26Does the open border policy make your job easier or harder?

04:29Are we safer or less safe as a result of the open border policy?

04:37I have been consistent over the years, frankly, in citing my concerns about the threats that

04:43emanate from the border, and as to the long narrative that you went through at the beginning,

04:48needless to say, I disagree very strongly with any number of aspects of it, but I recognize

04:53that we're time-limited.

04:54In the interest of time, I want you to acknowledge that the open border policy makes us more

04:58insecure than strong, so I want to know, what have your discussions been with the President?

05:05Have you been able to go into his office and say, boss, this open border policy is a galactically

05:10stupid policy from a national security perspective?

05:13Have you had that conversation?

05:15If so, what did that look like?

05:17What has been the response, and how are we shaping this to make us more secure in the

05:21future?

05:22I'm not going to get into specific conversations with people.

05:25I've been consistent in my message, externally and internally, about my concerns about the

05:30threats that are, from the FBI's perspective, that emanate from the border.

05:34I'm out of time, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.

SHOCK MOMENT: Mike Garcia Tells FBI's Wray 'I Don't Trust You' To His Face—Then Wray Responds

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