Former president Donald Trump has been looking for names of people to blame for federal investigations against him.
According to multiple knowledgeable sources, Trump is actively seeking information about senior FBI agents and Justice Department (DOJ) personnel. He has reportedly privately discussed the necessity of purging these officials and agents from the ranks of the FBI and DOJ if he were to return to the White House. This purge is crucial for him, as he considers the investigations into him as illegitimate “witch hunts.”
Trump has expressed a deep distrust of FBI director Christopher Wray and desires to remove him from the Bureau on “day one” of his potential second term. This sentiment is shared by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, Trump’s primary rival for the 2024 election.
Trump has been discussing with his close political allies the identification of FBI and DOJ staff, forming lists of individuals involved in these investigations. The conservative nonprofit Judicial Watch, led by Trump ally Tom Fitton, filed a Freedom of Information Act request to obtain details about employees in the office of Special Counsel Jack Smith, but the DOJ denied the request.
Email communications from Justice Department lawyers now obscure the full names of personnel involved in the special counsel’s team, using only initials in official DOJ email addresses.
The issue of revealing the identities of law enforcement personnel involved in the investigation at Mar-a-Lago has been contentious, with the FBI redacting agent names in the search warrant while Trump publicly posted the names of two agents involved. This action led to threats against FBI agents and an armed attack on the FBI’s Cincinnati field office.
