Jim Jordan Explains How The FBI Was Targeting Catholic Churches
As the FBI is already in hot water over their collusion with Twitter to censor Americans and the blatant weaponization and politicization of the bureau by the Biden administration, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) is now subpoenaing FBI Director Christopher Wray over yet another scandal — a memo obtained by the committee showing that the FBI was targeting Catholic churches.
The memo reportedly outlined a plan to “mitigate the threat of Radical-Traditionalist Catholics.”
Jordan appeared on Fox News Channel’s “Hannity” to discuss the FBI’s actions.
“The FBI in the Richmond field office was looking to put sources in churches — have informants in Catholic parishes. That’s what they were looking to do. Someone needs to give them a lesson in the First Amendment,” the Republican congressman told host Sean Hannity.
“This memorandum that they put together, that we now have… This memorandum talks about doing just that, and it was signed off on by two senior analysts and the chief division council there. How can a lawyer sign off on something like that?” he asked.
“And frankly, but for the whistleblower, I don’t know that this wouldn’t still be going on. And this thing was sent out to all the other field offices. Now stop and think for a second, yesterday [there] was probably more Americans in church than any other day of the year. The day we celebrate the resurrection of our Savior,” Jordan explained.
“Now what if this FBI thing was carried out? There would be people in the church spying on fellow parishioners, fellow churchgoers, that’s what they were looking to do,” he added. “That’s how scary this is, what they’ve done to the First Amendment.”
According to the original whistleblower, the FBI’s targeting of Catholic churches would specifically target those that still practice the Latin Mass.
The internal documents obtained last month by Jordan and Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) — who are also members of the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government — show that the FBI’s actions are part of a supposed effort to combat domestic terrorism and domestic extremism.
According to the documents, the FBI wanted to use churches as “new avenues for tripwire and source development” and had expressed interest in “leverag[ing] existing sources and/or initiat[ing] Type 5 Assessments to develop new sources with the placement and access.”
Jordan called out the FBI’s actions in a letter to Wray on Monday — and also issued a subpoena for related documents that the committee had previously requested from the FBI, which the bureau has failed to hand over.
“Based on the limited information produced by the FBI to the Committee, we now know that the FBI relied on at least one undercover agent to produce its analysis, and that the FBI proposed that its agents engage in outreach to Catholic parishes to develop sources among the clergy and church leadership to inform on Americans practicing their faith,” the letter read.
“This information is outrageous and only reinforces the Committee’s need for all FBI material responsive to our request,” the letter continued. “The documents produced to date show how the FBI sought to enlist Catholic houses of worship as potential sources to monitor and report on their parishioners.”
“Americans attend church to worship and congregate for their spiritual and personal betterment,” Jordan wrote. “They must be free to exercise their fundamental First Amendment rights without worrying that the FBI may have planted so-called “tripwire” sources or other informants in their houses of worship.”
