Patrick Basham, director of the Democracy Institute, a think tank, recently said that the FBI’s recent raid on Rudy Giuliani’s apartment and office was an apparent “political retaliation” against Giuliani and his client, former President Trump. -Former President Donald Trump (Trump) “political retaliation.
“This is clearly a political retaliation against Giuliani and Trump, and more broadly, against Trump’s inner circle,” Basham said in a recent interview with New Tang Dynasty Television.
Court documents show that FBI agents confiscated electronic devices belonging to Giuliani during the April 28 raid. Giuliani’s attorney said the search warrant implied that Giuliani was illegally unregistered as a foreign agent. Both he and Giuliani dispute the allegation.
Basham said the FBI has been increasingly used as a political tool in recent years, with Trump and those around him bearing the brunt of it. “It’s become clear over the last several years that the FBI has been weaponized for political purposes at the very least. In recent years, this has been primarily directed at Trump and those around him.” Basham said.
“What the FBI is trying to do here is not to take out Giuliani, but to try to get leverage, if any, on Trump and others within Trump’s circle. The most important thing is to intimidate, to warn anyone …… connected to Trump in order to make them avoid him and to make them afraid to do or say anything publicly to support the president (Trump),” he added.
Prosecutors in the case this week asked the judge to appoint a special judge or an outside judge to sift through records seized from Giuliani and another lawyer, Victoria Toensing, in a crackdown on his political enemies.
Basham also responded to the New York Times’ retraction of an inaccurate story about the raid on Giuliani. Dean Baquet, editor of the New York Times, admitted that the paper had not verified information from an anonymous source. The inaccurate information said, “The FBI informed Giuliani that ‘he was allegedly the target of a Russian intelligence operation.'” The New York Times and two other media outlets have since corrected their reporting on the matter, though the misinformation continues to circulate.
“This happens when the media don’t review their sources and look at detailed information in depth. They just accept unsubstantiated allegations,” Basham said.
He added, “At the very least, it’s misconduct. Time and time again, we see the incompetence of the mainstream media. Obviously, there are a lot of mistakes here. Some people think, if I may say so, that it’s nothing more than incompetence. But there is so much incompetence, and there are so many examples of it over time, especially with President Trump and the people around him, including Giuliani. After a while, it’s hard not to grow angry and think that it’s not media incompetence, but may actually be a conscious effort to spread this misinformation.”
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