Lone Candle
Champion of Truth
FBI raided John Bolton’s home in search of classified documents. Trump does not like Bolton because Bolton told the truth about Trump’s problems. This is potentially a huge abuse of power to harass someone who criticized the president. But maybe it’s legit, we’ll have to keep an eye on it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VC-ZyC-lc3Y
Trump administration ruins an FBI agent’s career because he’s friends with the wrong guy. Every other agent now has to worry that if they do something that bothers Trump, even something that is legal and legitimate!, they might lose their job.
This is not the way to retain the best employees for our government! Nor how a democratic country operates.
Trump removes people with great experience for bad reasons, then puts in shills he thinks are loyal. The remaining underlings see that the way to keep their jobs is to shut up, and do what they’re told, even if the shills at the top don’t know what they’re doing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3knpPbgMzA
“Texas already has several mechanisms to use in coaxing the Democrats back. Each day they’re gone, the fleeing Democrats incur a $500-per-day fine. Republican Gov. Greg Abbott also released an order for their arrest by the Texas Department of Public Safety, describing the Democrats’ conduct as “abandonment or forfeiture.” Republicans in the Texas House, meanwhile, have issued arrest warrants for the absent Democrats, and Attorney General Ken Paxton—who is challenging Cornyn in his re-election bid—has called for their removal from office.
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Regardless of how involved the FBI will become, the bureau’s involvement at all degrades the principle of federalism by infringing upon Texas’s authority to discipline its lawmakers. It is also the most recent example of the Trump Justice Department being weaponized for political gain and tasked with duties outside its standard wheelhouse.
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Though Patel dismissed concerns during his confirmation hearing that he would weaponize the FBI, he seems to have set his sights on the Texas Democrats, despite Trump’s Day One executive order to end the “weaponization of law enforcement and the weaponization of the Intelligence Community.”
While the Democrats’ plan is an attempt to circumvent a vote, they’ve broken no federal laws or statutes. There is simply no need for the FBI’s involvement.”
https://reason.com/2025/08/08/the-fbi-has-no-business-tracking-down-texas-democrats/
“”The FBI took Linda’s savings without clearly saying what she did wrong. That shouldn’t happen in America, but taking on the entrenched federal civil forfeiture system is challenging,” said Bob Belden, an attorney at I.J. (which represented Martin), in a statement via email. “Unfortunately, there is not a clear path to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. We know that several Justices are alarmed at how civil forfeiture works in America and hope that the right case will work its way to the Court.”
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“Owners must decide whether to fight against the federal government, default, or plead for mercy, all without knowing why the FBI is doing this to them,” he says. “It’s therefore little surprise that 93% of federal forfeitures never get to a court, meaning the FBI gets to keep the money without ever telling anyone why they should be allowed to”—which, at least for now, will remain the status quo.”
https://reason.com/2025/07/28/the-fbi-took-her-40000-without-explaining-why-she-fought-back-and-lost/
“That the government indeed thinks it is asking too much to do basic due diligence here—a.k.a., requiring agents to ensure they are in the right place before detonating an explosive inside a home and ripping the door from its hinges—epitomizes the state’s general allergy to accountability. More dire is that the argument has worked.”
https://reason.com/2025/05/09/government-argues-its-too-much-to-ask-the-fbi-to-check-the-address-before-blowing-up-a-home/
FBI links California fertility clinic bombing to anti-natalist ideology
https://www.yahoo.com/news/fbi-links-california-fertility-clinic-152927861.html
“Almost four years ago to the day, the FBI entered U.S. Private Vaults (USPV), a storage business in Beverly Hills, and raided the safe-deposit boxes there, pocketing tens of millions of dollars in cash, valuables, and personal items. Among those owners was Linda Martin, from whom agents took $40,200—her life savings—despite that she had not been charged with a crime.
Those charges would never come. Although USPV itself was ultimately indicted in federal court, the government had no case against unknowing customers like Martin, in a scheme that attorneys have compared to seizing property from individual apartment units because the tenants’ landlord was suspected of criminal wrongdoing. At USPV, the agency confiscated over $100 million in valuables from a slew of such people via civil forfeiture, the legal process that allows the government to take people’s property without having to prove its owners committed any crime.”
https://reason.com/2025/03/20/the-fbi-seized-this-womans-life-savings-without-telling-her-why/
FBI second-in-command has said he doesn’t believe in the separation of powers and all that matters is power. If someone would have said that he’d be appointed second in command before it was done, he would be accused of Trump-derangement syndrome.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZBa_0IOasY
FBI agents being fired for taking part in legitimate and important investigations.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QdzJXwOSmQ
“Trump allies are purging the Justice Department and FBI of perceived enemies. Elon Musk, empowered by Trump, has deployed a band of loyalists to take over the federal spending apparatus managed by the U.S. Treasury. Trump’s temporary pick to lead federal prosecutions in Washington says anyone who resists Musk’s efforts could be breaking “numerous laws.”
The White House is attempting to freeze virtually all federal grants, which nonprofits say is already wreaking havoc on programs for vulnerable Americans. With almost no notice, the administration has dismantled the agency responsible for international aid and offered millions of federal employees a buyout with questionable legal authority. Trump fired many of the internal watchdogs — inspectors general — who would review these decisions.”
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“Many of Washington’s legal veterans say they’re most alarmed and perplexed by Musk and his amorphous role in efforts to make massive, abrupt and ill-explained changes to the operations of the federal government. He routinely uses his social media platform, X, to characterize some government-funded programs as “criminal” and relished, for example, putting USAID — the agency responsible for administering international aid programs — through a “wood chipper.” Those claims of illegality have been coupled with a chorus of Trump’s MAGA allies characterizing the agency as a hotbed of progressive causes, suggesting the agency drew Trump allies’ ire for political reasons.
Musk has sent a team of allies to take control of computer systems at Treasury and in the Office of Personnel Management, which are responsible for delivering appropriated funds and overseeing the entire federal workforce. It’s unclear what responsibilities they have. Amid reports some of those incursions have been met with pushback, Washington, D.C.’s interim U.S. Attorney Ed Martin — a conservative culture warrior who was a prominent conspiracy theorist about the Jan.6 attack — offered to use his office to protect Musk’s efforts.”
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/04/trump-government-retribution-legal-battles-011469