An FBI whistleblower who testified before the House Judiciary Committee said that the bureau has confirmed that it had informants and undercover assets inside the Capitol Building on January 6, 2021 and said that is why they haven’t made all 11,000 hours of surveillance it collected from that day public.
When the FBI’s Washington Field Office asked the Boston Field Office to open investigations into 140 individuals who took buses from Massachusetts to D.C. on Jan. 6., it denied the Boston office’s request to view video that would prove those individuals were in the Capitol that day, saying they needed to protect the identities of possible “undercover officers” and “confidential human sources.”
This was the testimony of George Hill on February 10 before the House Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government.
The Boston office had opened cases on two of the 140 suspects because they organized the buses, but the WFO wanted cases opened on all of them. Boston declined because going to a rally was protected speech, and that’s all the 140 people were doing at that time.
It was a rally
“[People] think of the unlawful events that took place later on in the day on January 6th, but up until that time, it was a rally,” Hill said. “People were, you know, either driving to it, flying to it.”
According to Hill who said he heard the conversation firsthand, the Boston Supervisory Special Agent on the case asked why they couldn’t have access to the 11,000 hours of video the FBI had, but the FBI said there “may be” undercover officers or confidential human sources “on those videos whose identity we need to protect.”
Despite numerous speculations that FBI agents and informants were in the crowd that pushed its way into the Capitol that day, FBI Director Christopher Wray refused during November testimony to say whether that was the case.
In addition, Executive Assistant Director of the FBI National Security Branch, Jill Sanborn dodged the question when asked by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) about it in January.
Praise for whistleblowers
House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan (R-OH) praised Hill and other whistleblowers who have taken risks to expose information that the FBI and other agencies are trying to keep secret.
“Our whistleblowers are brave individuals who risk their reputations and livelihoods to expose wrongdoing,” Jordan (R-OH) told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “There are already immense obstacles in place deterring whistleblowers from coming forward and we hope Democrat leaks and partisan criticisms don’t chill other whistleblowers from coming forward.”
Democrats have mainly focused on getting former President Donald Trump and have characterized the events of the day as an “insurrection,” ignoring the fact that no concerted effort was made to take over the government and that no one used force to remain in the building.
Instead, Capitol Police shot Ashli Babbitt for trying to enter the Speaker’s Lobby through a broken door, and when police told the breachers to leave, they did.
The full truth about the events of that day may never come out, but if it does, it will be because of whistleblowers like Hill.
