GARDENERVILLE, NEVADA — Ron DeSantis shared his plan for restoring the FBI to its “original mission” if elected president in 2024.
When asked what changes are needed at the federal law enforcement agency, DeSantis emphasized a return to its “core mission.”
“New FBI director on day one,” he told a reporter at the 8th annual Basque Fry in Northern Nevada on Saturday.
“What the FBI needs to do is focus on things that its core missions were. Focus on urban crime. Focus on dealing with Chinese Communist Party influence. Focus on stopping all the drugs coming across the border.”
On Tuesday, pro-DeSantis super PAC Never Back Down posted a short video from the interview on Twitter.
On day one as president, Ron DeSantis will install a new FBI Director and clean up the agency.
— Never Back Down (@NvrBackDown24) June 21, 2023
"There's been a lot of power in that agency concentrated in Washington, D.C., and I think those folks in Washington have a much different agenda than the average American." pic.twitter.com/WToLgLyFEp
Saturday was not the first time DeSantis had promised to appoint new leadership at the FBI. On May 25, he told Fox News’ Trey Gowdy he would remove the Bureau's current director Chris Wray on the first day of his presidency.
“The Department of Justice and FBI have lost their way. They've been weaponized against Americans who think like me and you,” the governor told Gowdy. “Republican presidents have accepted the canard that the DOJ and FBI are ‘independent.’ They are not independent agencies, they are part of the executive branch. They answer to the elected President of the United States.”
THE WEAPONIZED FBI
The governor’s latest comments on the subject came hours before the Florida GOP distributed a survey that found 9 in 10 conservatives do not hold a “great deal of confidence” that the justice system operates with fairness and equality to all Americans.
Since 2016, Republicans have decried political persecution and “weaponization” of the agency – and for good reason. Last month, special prosecutor John Durham excoriated the FBI over the 2016 Trump-Russia collusion hoax. Durham admonished the agency for launching a full-fledged investigation based on “raw, unanalyzed and uncorroborated intelligence.”
In March, FBI whistleblower Garret O’Boyle claimed that the FBI began targeting pro-life pregnancy centers after the U.S. Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022.
Town Hall reporter Mia Cathell’s bombshell video in October 2022 showed FBI agents with assault rifles raiding the home of a pro-life activist.
🚨 One of the pro-life leaders targeted by Biden's DOJ sent me footage of the early morning FBI raid on his family home. Paul Vaughn was placed in handcuffs by armed FBI agents in front of his children just before school drop-off. Watch as his wife pleads for answers mid-arrest: https://t.co/lUP6tJOSzW pic.twitter.com/XeYComC6mZ
— Mia Cathell (@MiaCathell) October 7, 2022
Last week, former President Donald Trump was arraigned on 37 counts related to his handling of classified documents. On Tuesday, Hunter Biden pleaded guilty to two tax misdemeanors as part of a deal with federal prosecutors.
READ MORE: DeSantis Slams DOJ Over Hunter Biden’s “Sweetheart Deal”
“People are very upset and concerned about the unequal justice that’s being carried out when it comes to conservatives versus liberals,” Florida GOP Chair Ziegler told The Florida Standard. “It’s so dangerous to be weaponizing the justice system. When you lose faith and trust in [the justice system] it puts everything at risk.”
