The FBI is reexamining some major Biden-era controversies, including the infamous case, the and cases involving the Supreme Court, and cocaine found at the White House in 2023. Alex Blumberg and Peter Bergen talk all about it.
00:01:11.620Part of a plan to dramatically downsize the advisory body, which has already undergone major restructuring during the second Trump administration, including the replacement of NSA Mike Waltz with Marco Rubio, who is wearing two hats, serving as secretary of state as well.
00:01:28.080And the firing of five key aides in April on the advice of far-right activist Laura Loomer.
00:01:34.340FBI Director Cash Patel and Deputy Director Dan Bongino are facing pressure from Trump's base to ramp up their actions against the, quote, weaponization they spent years railing against.
00:01:46.120Dan Bongino announced the FBI is reexamining some major Biden-era controversies.
00:01:51.240Pipe bombs found near the RNC on January 6th, 2021.
00:01:56.140The leak of the Supreme Court's Dobbs decision in 2022.
00:02:00.120And cocaine found at the White House in 2023.
00:02:03.700Joining us now, we have NBC News Justice and Intelligence correspondent, Kendallanian.
00:02:07.900And Lisa Rubin is still with us here in the studio.
00:02:10.820Can you first, what do we know about these cases so far and how they were chosen?
00:02:14.840Well, Alex, I think you put your finger on it.
00:02:18.940They were chosen because these two men who are leading the FBI for years have been fomenting conspiracy theories.
00:02:25.300And now the base is asking them to deliver on many of them.
00:02:28.600And there are some that they just can't, like the Jeffrey Epstein case.
00:02:31.320But these are cases of controversy where they think there's some more room to run here.
00:02:36.840Take a listen to, I think we have some sound from the FBI Director Cash Patel.
00:02:47.600So, look, in terms of the FBI pipe bomb case, Dan Bongino, the Deputy Director, was saying before he got the job that he believed, more than he believed,
00:02:58.780he asserted blindly that this was an inside job, that the FBI was lying when they said they didn't know who the suspect was,
00:03:05.160that he believed that this was an embarrassment that was trying to cover up the fact that the January 6th narrative, as he put it, was not what we thought it to be.
00:03:13.760Since he's taken office, he hasn't said those things.
00:03:16.640But now he is saying he's going to they're going to reinvestigate the pipe bomb case.
00:03:20.500In terms of the Supreme Court leak, you know, there was an investigation, didn't go anywhere for obvious reasons.
00:03:25.340That's going to be a really difficult case to solve.
00:03:27.680Same with the cocaine in the White House.
00:03:34.000But now the FBI wants to put more resources in.
00:03:36.280One final thing I will add about this is to Donald Trump, it doesn't matter too much about the numbers.
00:03:42.000What matters to him is limiting the sort of extra eyes and ears that are in the White House.
00:03:47.960Remember, he was furious with the National Security Council because he blamed it for overhearing his phone call with Vladimir Zelensky,
00:03:57.760which led to his first impeachment hearing.
00:04:01.000This was the call in which he pressured Zelensky to announce an investigation of the Biden family and to imply that the family was corrupt during their election, his campaign for reelection.
00:04:14.280So he views the council as a worrisome source of leaks, a worrisome source of experts that will get in his way.
00:04:21.740And I really can't emphasize enough about what Carol was saying, that these are individuals, you know, there is a process.
00:04:27.420And there are a lot of people who think it's too bureaucratic, it's too bloated.
00:06:00.600And so one of the questions that I have is at what point does a critical mass of Americans and a sufficient number of Americans emerge from really this kind of apathy in some quarters,
00:06:13.940hostility in other quarters, to reimagine the American founding and to sort of re-found the United States in a way that recaptures what the founders wanted
00:06:26.100in integrity and leadership, accountability amongst the branches of government, all of that is breaking down right now, all of it.
00:06:33.540And it's being broken down to thunderous applause on parts of the right.
00:06:38.460And that's the thing, going full circle to the beginning of the top of this hour, this is the thing that concerns me the most,
00:06:44.340is the enthusiasm and the popularity of many of these punitive acts and many of these corrupt acts.
00:08:00.220So that's David French saying we have affirmative hatred.
00:08:03.380No, we're trying to take down the administrative state and the deep state, brother, that has driven this country into a ditch that we need to get it out of to make it great again.
00:08:14.320Part of that ditch is obviously this insane spending on the forever wars.
00:08:18.460The NSC 100, I think it could have been even more because I think the billets are 250 to 300.
00:08:23.680The NSC used to be 10, 20 people, National Security Council.
00:08:26.860So he's sending home the detailees from all these different – the Pentagon, the Justice Department, the CIA.
00:08:34.860Basically, I think you ought to fire them and get them gone out of the entire government.
00:08:39.000But he's sending – President Trump is sending them back, getting them out of the ELB, getting them out of the White House.
00:08:44.640You don't need a National Security Council that big.
00:08:47.960President Trump's got political appointees.
00:08:49.380He's going to put his own people in there, the detailees who are just all deep staters.
00:08:54.000And remember, it's not that they were listening to the phone call, Washington Post reporter.
00:09:00.240It's not that they were listening to the phone call.
00:09:01.980The perfect phone call is that they lied about what was said, twisted it, and trumped up a bizarro impeachment that we now know about the corruption of Zelensky and Biden.
00:09:14.440Notice the mainstream media is not all over the Biden story.
00:09:43.920I know you've got some very strong opinions about this, ma'am.
00:09:46.100Well, first of all, we were just joking here in the studio about David French and how much we missed him because he did take a Twitter X break.
00:09:55.420And now like a cicada, like the little bug that he is.
00:09:58.820He has reemerged with more of his babbling BS.
00:10:02.480David French, not only who ran for president in 2016, but of course a happy promoter of every anti-Trump hoax from Russiagate to Ukrainegate to very fine people to the insurrection.
00:10:15.700You know, and the idea that he wants to reimagine American democracy when the public's trust in every institution, including the media, is at all-time lows.
00:10:28.940Anyway, it's so nice to have David French back.
00:10:33.500Now that you brought it up, anytime somebody – you see this in Hollywood.
00:10:38.540When they talk about reimagine, what that means is they're taking a classic film and they're going to destroy it with some crap they're going to make now with a bunch of hacks they have in Hollywood and hack writers like David French.
00:10:50.240So I don't think we need to reimagine the Constitution.
00:11:16.520Well, remember, too, David French infamously called Drag Queen Story Hour a blessing of liberty, so one can only imagine what his newly found democracy would look like.
00:11:35.080So, at any rate, so, yes, so back to what we're talking about with the FBI.
00:11:41.440I think you and I might have just a slight disagreement here on what Cash and Dan are doing.
00:11:47.200I understand the frustration of the base.
00:11:50.240Of course, you know that – I mean, this FBI is the one that I covered who was using battering rams against veterans who, with no criminal record,
00:12:00.120you know, destroying their homes, their lives, their families over nonviolent protests at the Capitol on January 6th.
00:12:07.380So, and, of course, the Whitmer case, which we'll talk about as well.
00:12:11.000But I think the depth of corruption there, and this is what I'm hearing from my sources, is far worse than anyone imagined.
00:12:20.520And all you have to do is look at James Comey's recent comments.
00:12:24.780That mindset has infected the 37,000 employee workforce of the FBI, every single field office, 56 field offices, of course, main headquarters.
00:12:37.600So it's not like new leadership – and I know you're not suggesting that – just magically goes in, and then they become normal human beings.
00:12:45.140So, Julie, but Julie, you and I are totally in agreement.
00:13:20.020He's talking about – I mean, he's a complete police state fascist, and he's talking about going back and taking the FBI, and this is what is the problem.
00:13:29.220If they steal 2028, they're coming back, and we haven't taken the thing apart.
00:13:33.360I want to take it apart brick by brick and have a Carthaginian peace salt the earth around it so it can never grow back, ma'am.
00:14:03.080These cowards in Washington would fight every – and they're probably doing it behind the scenes, I would imagine – to dismantle and destroy the FBI start from scratch or at least preserve little parts of it to help with major crime threats.
00:14:19.000I agree, but we've got to hit them – he's from the godfather.
00:14:23.540We've got to hit them while we're strong.
00:14:29.380And I will tell you, if you bring this to the forefront and have that battle that you and I want to have, and I think Cash and Dan want to have also, with the powers that be on the deep state and on Capitol Hill, the funding sources, President Trump's going to throw in with us.
00:14:45.960He's going to say, yeah, this is what – you know, give me some of this.
00:14:48.780This is what – I tell you what, let's take a short break.
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00:16:36.580When you see the financial mess that we've got to work our way out of, that the Senate's now going to take on the big, beautiful bill, President Trump, all of it, Japanese bond market.
00:17:41.780Let's go ahead and play it, and we'll bring back the great Julie Kelly.
00:17:44.660Do you think there's a – I mean, one of the things that is happening now is that the Trump administration is, of course, testing the system in ways it hasn't been tested before.
00:17:53.740In the law enforcement sense, do you think there are laws that should be put in place that would help better manage this that aren't in place now?
00:18:17.220You know that one of the two political parties is, let me put it nicely, white supremacist adjacent at a minimum.
00:18:25.080And so why would you want to throw your career on that side of the line and be summoned to Capitol Hill to be asked, why are you pursuing these innocent groups?
00:18:32.780And so we have a cultural impediment to working it effectively that should get more attention than it does.
00:18:40.000Why he is not in prison, he's a disgusting and revolting human being.
00:18:43.840And the system that created him is disgusting and revolting.
00:22:26.700Hey, I'm recommending a Tom Fenton, Julie Kelly, Rudy Giuliani team – I'll throw Rogan O'Hanley in there, too – that advise we get a top prosecutor,
00:22:38.040a team of prosecutors, and let's roll, baby.
00:22:41.800Yes, and the old Julie Kelly is still here, but I guess my concern is you destroy the FBI, dismantle it at this point.
00:22:52.320How do we get those answers, I guess, is my concern, that they've already buried and hidden and probably destroyed so much evidence that we need.
00:23:09.280In the process of taking a part, I feel comfortable that the smart people with Fenton and Julie Kelly and Rudy and Rogan and top prosecutors and people will put on here,
00:23:19.580maybe even take Ed Martin out of justice and give it to him, the top people will have it.
00:23:23.940And the passion that people will have for this, I feel – I'll take that bet.
00:23:28.660I feel highly confident that we will find it.
00:25:14.360I just have never cared about it personally.
00:25:16.060You've got to get to the files because in the files you're going to find out the – I know, but you're – no, no, but I'm saying it's – you'll get to the cover-up of exactly what the cover-up was.
00:25:23.280They're even admitting they've got these tapes and things.
00:25:25.320This is Cash and – and Pam, you've got to get – once you get into these things, the rich – as you know, Julie, you've done it yourself.
00:25:33.020With no resource at all, just doing it yourself, you understand as you start these investigations, every day you tell me, hey, I found this, I found this.
00:25:40.740The process itself delivers – once you have intention and start moving down, the process itself – I tell you, Julie, hang on for one second.
00:26:17.320I was just listening to a podcast this morning talking about how the war room has popularized this idea of suspending the writ of habeas corpus.
00:26:25.140But the media keeps shrieking about a constitutional crisis happening or about to happen with Trump.
00:26:34.740The constitutional crisis is already here.
00:26:37.380We have a historic record number of national injunctions issued by these leftist activists in black robes called judges at the federal district court level who have hamstrung the duly elected president.
00:26:53.120And they have ripped apart the Constitution.
00:26:56.180That is the constitutional crisis that an unelected Marxist judge in a singular federal district in some, you know, judicial shopped area by Democrats can stop the president from deporting violent cartels, okay?
00:27:12.540To rectify this constitutional crisis, Trump has to suspend the writ of habeas corpus for illegal aliens only and ship these people out.
00:27:23.580All we want is what they did on Martha's Vineyard.
00:27:26.620When a few dozen illegals got shipped there, they mobilized the National Guard and they shipped them off the island in 48 hours or less without a trial.
00:27:34.760If it's good enough for Martha's Vineyard, it's good enough for the rest of the country.
00:31:28.420What in the hell is going on in Texas, sir?
00:31:30.860Oh, you know, it's always a challenge when the Democrats end up deciding who the leadership is, the Speaker in Texas.
00:31:40.700And that's been going on for 17 years.
00:31:43.140And to varying degrees, all of them have some allegiance to the people that got them elected.
00:31:48.100And that is truly the case in every Speaker that I've seen since Joe Strauss pulled this off in like 2011.
00:31:55.760The Democrats have had more ability to influence the process than they should, given the fact that we have a majority, a pretty strong majority in the Texas House and a pretty strong majority in the Senate.
00:32:07.700The Senate is controlled by Republicans.
00:32:50.840I mean, I was out for nine months campaigning against Republican incumbent House members before this last session.
00:32:56.920And we changed out 26 incumbents either quit or were beaten in a primary.
00:33:02.200So I'm definitely part of the process of changing the Texas House to become more Republican and to stick together as Republicans instead of letting the Democrats control who gets elected as Speaker in the Texas House.
00:33:16.500General Paxson, where do people go for social media and also to find out about their heroic run for the United States Senate, sir?
00:33:23.980KenPaxson.com and at KenPaxsonTX for Twitter.
00:33:40.860I mean, yeah, it's been a few hours since I've seen you and just in the last couple hours since we've talked.
00:33:44.920So what have we done in the Texas House?
00:33:46.500On the Texas House floor, the duly elected, multiply elected conservative attorney general of the state of Texas, Ken Paxton, was not allowed.
00:34:23.400They put a Bernie Sanders-style college student loan repayment program on the House floor.
00:34:27.820We conservatives somehow, a rare success.
00:34:30.120We killed the bill, which is very rare.
00:34:32.440But House leadership was not going to be content with that.
00:34:35.180So they had a bunch of their rhinos go up and literally pretend, you can see it on tape, they made them pretend their voting machines malfunctioned so that they could save this Democrat bill to literally push Joe Biden's agenda on the Texas House floor.
00:34:50.160So Ken Paxton banned from the Texas House floor.
00:34:52.920Joe Biden's student loan repayment program, that was forced through just in the last couple hours since I've talked to you.
00:34:59.600And by the way, that bill was just one of 81 Democrat bills that they have put on our bill filing deadline here on the Texas House floor.
00:35:07.660So Texas voters are red, but the Texas government down here, controlled by the Liberal Union Party, they're blue.
00:36:02.460For far too long we have just been coasting on that reputation.
00:36:06.120I'll give you just one example that breaks my heart and makes me angry.
00:36:09.980In some ways we have bigger government and more regulations than states like California and New York.
00:36:15.140And just one example, we have more occupational licensing regulations than every state in America, and that includes California and New York.
00:36:23.680Just in the last two budget cycles, we have grown our state budget by 42 percent.
00:36:29.000That's a bigger growth rate than D.C. Democrats come up with or than big blue states like California and New York.
00:36:35.660It's absolutely outrageous, and people have no idea.
00:36:38.480People just think of Texas as this big, great Republican pro-liberty state, you know, elected Trump by 14 points.
00:36:43.060But the Republicans down here – what we have is a bunch of Democrats that know they can't get elected unless they run as Republicans.
00:36:48.180They run as Republicans, they lie to their voters, and then they tax Texans out of their home to advance the Biden agenda.
00:36:53.540And I'm just doing everything I can to expose voters to the truth, to bring transparency.
00:36:57.900And I'm always grateful to you and the posse for opening the eyes, not just to 30 million Texans who need to know the betrayal that these rhinos are exercising against them,
00:37:07.100but to Republicans who care about saving our state and our country all across the United States.
00:37:13.060And you're going to go to work tomorrow to set things right there because something's not right with Texas.
00:37:17.480If we lose Texas, as Texas goes, so goes the nation, sir.
00:37:38.240I got censured by the GOP caucus because I had the audacity to endorse and campaign for movement conservatives who wanted to push the Trump agenda, the conservative, the pro-liberty agenda in Texas.
00:37:49.880I was censured for it because I traveled around the state going into my incumbent Rhino colleagues' districts and educating their voters.
00:37:56.500Let me tell you what, Texas voters, they are sick and tired of being gaslit by establishment politicians who at every chance vote to grow government and bankrupt the next generation, to empower Democrats, to collude with them, to destroy liberty.
00:38:11.000Going home, these rhinos going home and telling them they're fighting for small government conservative principles when the reality is they're doing the opposite.
00:38:19.880Texas voters deserve the truth, and I couldn't be more excited as we're closing out a train wreck, absolute dumpster fire of a session.
00:38:29.140Texans would have been far better off at this liberal crony corporatism, DEI, you know, funding, LGBTQ empowering.
00:38:36.980If this session never happened, Texans would have been better off.
00:38:40.320But I'm excited as we go into the next election cycle because these Republicans, I'm going to do everything I can to make sure they have nowhere to hide.
00:38:49.860Texans deserve bold, real, fearless Republican leadership that will not bend a knee to the swamp, but who's committed to destroying the swamp in Austin.
00:39:00.700Harrison, where do people go for your social media, a website, to follow you?
00:39:04.700Yeah, at Brian E. Harrison on X, at Brian E. Harrison.
00:39:09.500And I ask folks, please take two seconds, go to at Brian E. Harrison on X because none of the media in the whole state of Texas is being willing to tell voters the truth.
00:39:18.060That's why the corrupt Texas House leadership has been able to get away with this for so long, as you just heard Attorney General Paxton talking about.
00:39:26.220The Democrats quite literally select the speaker in the Republican-controlled Texas House.
00:39:31.500So I'm trying to bring a new level of transparency on my X feed at Brian E. Harrison.
00:40:11.140This is – I guarantee if there's actually some investigating into their communications, we would find coordination with these judges, right?
00:40:18.700We already found that Chief Justice Roberts is in the same little secret judge club in D.C. with Judge Boasberg, who, by the way, used to be on the FISA court that approved the warrant to spy on President Trump.
00:40:30.860And then now he's getting picked for all these Trump cases about, you know, deporting violent cartels or whatever.
00:40:38.140Listen, this is being coordinated, which is why I actually like this investigation by Bongino and Cash into the leaker of the Dobbs decision because it potentially implicates a conservative Supreme Court justice.
00:40:52.660And I say if that's true, we figure out who it is, and if that is a criminal action, we discuss punitive measures up to and including impeachment.
00:41:07.060The only person flexing actual power right now is President Trump, and he's fighting the entire machine.
00:41:13.320Why is Congress not dragging these judges in for impeachment hearings or at least questioning as to if these are being coordinated or if they believe that federal district judges should have the power to give these national injunctions against the U.S. president by the dozen?
00:41:30.080So it's time to start taking stronger steps to actually accomplish what President Trump was elected on with majority Hispanic men's support, with a majority vote in this country.
00:42:09.640If they're not going to go forward with impeachment, we already heard Speaker Mike Johnson say that they won't, then at least hold some sort of public hearing,
00:42:18.800compel the production of their documents and their communication, just like we saw judges in Washington do to the president and his entire White House team and his campaign staff.
00:42:31.320Look, I have a piece up at my sub stack, declassified with Julie Kelly.
00:42:35.820I urge everyone to go there because I have linked an order from appellate court judge James Ho, who last week eviscerated the Supreme Court for its involvement in that Texas Alien Enemies Act lawsuit.
00:42:50.860He compared he compared he compared federal courtrooms to Denny's restaurants, saying that now they are operating on demand 24 seven for these groups, especially the ACLU, to give them whatever they want, not allowing the president or the DOJ or Homeland Security or anyone else time to respond to these lawsuits.
00:43:12.900It's rubber stamping all of these special interest groups who are defending illegal aliens who are criminals.
00:43:20.280And so these judges need to be held to account.
00:43:22.940But I urge everyone to read that opinion from James Ho, who should be at the top of the list right now of Donald Trump's Supreme Court shortlist for Supreme Court nominees.
00:45:38.280Rogan, you've started something that's going to get big and bigger, and it's actually going to come into effect because President Lincoln had to do it.
00:46:16.380Right now, the Supreme Court is debating internally about the extent and the power of these federal district court judges to issue these national injunctions.
00:46:25.720If they make a ruling that they are able to continue completely stalling the presidency, executive two powers to deport illegal aliens, then President Trump will have no choice but to suspend the writ of habeas corpus and save this country.
00:47:13.080If there's five Trenda-Aragua illegals up under Alien Enemies Act before a judge, the judge doesn't get to say every Trenda-Aragua across the country is protected.
00:47:22.960They get to say these three or four are protected or they aren't.
00:47:26.800If the Supreme Court does not limit these injunctions to just the parties before the district courts, then that solidifies that we are in a constitutional crisis and Trump will have to take drastic measures to repel this historic invasion.
00:47:40.060D.C., where do people get you on your social media?
00:47:51.440Listen, this was an idea that you brought up, and now it's got a lot of legs.
00:47:58.560People want this because this is a moment in history where a president has a chance to step up and become a historic figure, and I think one of those times is now.
00:48:33.860But he is spot on when he's talking about what is happening with these federal judges in these courtrooms and what he just said about these injunctions.
00:48:42.080And I just want to underscore what he's talking about.
00:48:44.660The ACLU, for example, will go to court.
00:48:47.180They will file a motion for a temporary restraining order, which is the precedent for a preliminary injunction.
00:48:53.220They will name five anonymous illegal Venezuelans tied to Trenteragua that the DOJ, that the government wants to immediately remove.
00:49:02.120Then they ask for a class-wide status.
00:49:11.480The ACLU, you've got at least a dozen lawyers on every single brief, every single motion.
00:49:17.340Then they ask the judge, okay, take these five anonymous illegals, turn that into an entire class, which is what Judge Bosberg did in the very first lawsuit in Washington in March.
00:50:15.580So how do you have these federal judges not just protecting these illegals but defying the president and his team who, of course, have analyzed this, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, including Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, including AG Pambandi and her team.
00:50:31.260And you have some random federal DEI judge in Colorado who is disagreeing with this entire administration and defying the will of the American people who made immigration the number one issue in the 2024 election.
00:50:45.860So these judges, and again, shame on Congress for being so silent and so cowardly in taking on these judges.
00:50:54.120Steve, if we would have held impeachment proceedings, and you and I talked about this a few years ago, for Beryl Howell or Ahmet Mehta or any of the other D.C. judges who were completely destroying the constitutional rights of Americans for J-6, we would see a much different judicial climate right now.
00:51:12.600But instead, they are all off the rails and every single one of them acting in a rogue capacity.
00:51:18.680And Congress didn't take any – the $10 billion didn't take $2 billion off.