For more than four years, a wide variety of Republican conspiracy theorists clung to a ridiculous idea about the Jan. 6 attack: It was federal law enforcement, they’ve claimed, that secretly instigated the insurrectionist assault on the Capitol. The absurd claims grew so common that they were given a name: the “fedsurrection” narrative.
Indeed, at the heart of the theory is the idea that insurrectionist rioters were actually the victims on Jan. 6: These poor, unsuspecting partisans were actually entrapped by nefarious FBI personnel, the story goes.
The theory has long been preposterous, and late last year, it was definitely discredited when the Justice Department’s inspector general, Michael Horowitz, unveiled the detailed findings of a four-year investigation, which concluded that while there were FBI informants at the Capitol, no FBI officials were responsible for instigating the attack.
The trouble is, Republicans didn’t read the report — or the reporting about the report.
And so, when a conservative online outlet claimed late last week to have “bombshell” about the FBI and Jan. 6, Donald Trump and members of his team once again told the public that the FBI “staged” the attack on the Capitol and “secretly placed” agents in the Jan. 6 crowds. These partisans were, of course, either deeply confused or brazenly lying: FBI personnel went to the Capitol to assist the Capitol Police after the assault began, but that’s neither new nor controversial.
Even FBI Director Kash Patel released a “clarification,” pushing back against his own allies’ conspiracy theory, though that didn’t stop House Speaker Mike Johnson from peddling outrageously false claims soon after to a national television audience.
But Trump’s online harangue about this nonsense went further than just the usual misinformation. From the president’s missive published to his social media platform:
It was just revealed that the FBI had secretly placed, against all Rules, Regulations, Protocols, and Standards, 274 FBI Agents into the Crowd just prior to, and during, the January 6th Hoax. This is different from what Director Christopher Wray stated, over and over again! That’s right, as it now turns out, FBI Agents were at, and in, the January 6th Protest, probably acting as Agitators and Insurrectionists, but certainly not as ‘Law Enforcement Officials.’ … Christopher Wray, the then Director of the FBI, has some major explaining to do. That’s two in a row, Comey and Wray, who got caught LYING, with our Great Country at stake. WE CAN NEVER LET THIS HAPPEN TO AMERICA AGAIN!
Again, the details Trump presented as fact are, in reality, entirely fictional. But pay particular attention to the fact that the president specifically took aim at Wray — the former FBI director he appointed, before ultimately pushing him out without cause — explicitly (and falsely) arguing that Wray lied about what happened on Jan. 6.
A day later, Trump told NBC News that he believes Wray engaged in “inappropriate” behavior during his tenure at the bureau and said he “would think” the Justice Department is investigating him. “I would imagine. I would certainly imagine. I would think they are doing that,” Trump said when he was asked whether the Justice Department should investigate Wray. “I think it’s very inappropriate what he, what he did. And I think a lot of his service was very inappropriate. But we haven’t gone beyond that. Don’t forget, we just found out about all of these FBI agents being there,” Trump added, referring to revelations with no foundation in reality. In other words, the president on Thursday successfully orchestrated a criminal indictment against one former FBI director he forced out (James Comey), and a couple of days later, the same president raised the prospect of a Justice Department investigation into a different former FBI director he forced out (Chris Wray). This is obvious madness, though it’s apparently happening anyway.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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