Well well well now…
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editor’s note: Paul Callan is a CNN legal analyst, a former New York homicide prosecutor and current counsel at the New York law firm of Edelman & Edelman PC, focusing on wrongful conviction and civil rights cases. Follow him on Twitter @paulcallan. The opinions expressed in this commentary are his own.
(CNN) – The ferocity of President Donald Trump’s recent attacks on the integrity of the FBI has sent shock waves through an agency accustomed to public adulation in recent years. Sadly, much of the presidential criticism of the bureau may be entirely legitimate.
The FBI has traditionally enjoyed a highly favorable reputation among a majority of the nation’s citizens. Despite controversial programs that sometimes employed illegal forms of surveillance and enforcement methods — such as those used on black citizens lawfully protesting racial segregation, individuals in the “red scare” of the 1950s and long-haired students and others protesting the war in Vietnam during the 1960s and ’70s — this reputation endured.
And American presidents continued to steadfastly defend the bureau — that is, until now. …
While I rarely agree with much of what the President does or says regarding legal issues, this time he’s got it right. The FBI’s reputation has been severely damaged not by the President’s criticism but by a systematic failure of the bureau’s leadership.
To read the article in its entirety, click here.
