6:27
- ABC News
- December 16, 2019
Former FBI director slams Barr for attacks on FBI
Political fallout from the DOJ IG's report continues a week after its release.
6:27
Despite the president's misgivings about the FBI, however, internal numbers obtained by ABC News tell a different story about morale at the bureau.
According to the most recent FBI \"climate\" survey, morale internally was up for the first time in two years.
The survey, obtained by Lawfare through a FOIA lawsuit, asked FBI employees among other things, if they are proud to work for or are cynical of the bureau -- and if they have a high level of respect for FBI's senior executives. All of the questions were answered positively and showed an uptick in the bureau's morale from years past when it was on the decline.
The FBI has also seen an increase in applicants in the past year, according to an FBI spokesperson.
\"I have complete confidence in Mr. Wray, and I know that the F.B.I. is not a broken institution,\" Webster wrote in response to the president. \"It is a professional agency worthy of respect and support. The derision and aspersions are dangerous and unwarranted.\"
Webster's article is only the latest development in the political fallout from Inspector General Michael Horowitz's more than 400-page report examining the Russia investigation released just one week ago.
While Horowitz determined the investigation was opened based with proper predication and found no evidence of political bias, he was also highly critical of how agents handled the court-authorized surveillance of former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.
\"We identified significant inaccuracies and omissions in each of the four [FISA] applications,\" Horowitz said in testimony last Wednesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee. \"Seven in the first application and a total of 17 by the final renewal application.\"
Horowitz added he could not rule out political bias was behind the mishandling of the surveillance process, he said he was not able to uncover evidence that spoke to the agents' motivations.
Barr in an interview said he believed Horowitz's non-determination \"leaves open the possibility to infer bad faith\" on the part of the FBI agents, which he said is what a separate ongoing investigation by U.S. attorney John Durham is looking to further explore.
Both Barr and Durham said they did not agree with one of Horowitz's key determinations that the Russia probe was launched with proper cause, a move that Webster took direct issue with.
\"The country can ill afford to have a chief law enforcement officer dispute the Justice Department’s own independent inspector general’s report and claim that an F.B.I. investigation was based on 'a completely bogus narrative,'\" Webster said. \"In fact, the report conclusively found that the evidence to initiate the Russia investigation was unassailable.\"
![\"PHOTO:](\"http://a.abcnews.com/images/Politics/james-comey-gty-jc-190528_hpEmbed_2_3x2_384.jpg\")
The report's extensive documentation of alleged wrongdoing by some of the agents involved in the counter-intelligence probe of the Trump campaign, however, led former FBI Director James Comey to backtrack from past statements where he claimed the FISA process \"was handled in a thoughtful and appropriate way.\"
\"I was wrong,\" Comey said in an interview with Fox News Sunday. \"I was overconfident as director in the procedures and it's important that a leader be accountable and transparent.\"
Initially, Comey had said the IG report's determination the Russia investigation amounted to complete \"vindication\" for himself and other FBI leaders excoriated by Trump over the past two years.
\"It doesn't vindicate anyone at the FBI who touched this, including the leadership,\" Horowitz said Wednesday.
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