The Atlantic

The Cost of Trump's Attacks on the FBI

When cabinet officials don’t push back on Trump’s efforts to delegitimize their agencies, they leave their staff frustrated and demoralized.
Source: Yuri Gripas / Reuters

In July, I had dinner with a friend who has worked as a lawyer in the Justice Department for decades. My friend bemoaned the recent tweets by the president of the United States that called into question the integrity of the Justice Department. Why isn’t Attorney General Jeff Sessions “looking into Crooked Hillarys crimes & Russia relations?,” asked President Trump in one such (ungrammatical) tweet. And why didn’t Sessions “replace Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe, a Comey friend who was in charge of Clinton investigation?”

My friend was desolate because the president was baselessly questioning the integrity of senior leaders in the Justice Department—of the attorney general

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