Frank Figliuzzi: The FBI Way

become a sustaining member of the commonwealth  club for just 10 a month join today   hello everyone and welcome to today's virtual  program at the commonwealth club of california   i'm ellen nakashima a national security reporter  with the washington post and i'm excited to be   moderating this program today i'm pleased to  be joined by frank figlucci a former assistant   director of the fbi's counterintelligence division  and author of the fantastic new book the fbi way   inside the bureau's code of excellence frank  served with the fbi and field offices in atlanta   san francisco miami and cleveland and at  headquarters in washington dc he's worked   public corruption foreign terrorism and  counter-intelligence significantly he also   investigated other fbi agents and supervisors as  head of the office of professional responsibility   now he is sharing the core values that undergird  what is arguably the premier law enforcement   organization in the world he calls it the fbi  way he's condensed them into what he calls the   seven seas code conservancy clarity consequences  compassion credibility and consistency i'm looking   forward to hearing how frank thinks the fbi lived  up to these seven c's or sometimes fell short   of these values if you're watching along with  us please and have questions for frank please   put them in the text chat on youtube and we'll  be getting to them later in the program thank   you frank for joining us ellen my thanks is  to you for agreeing to moderate this i'm i'm   honored that we could do this together and i'm  excited about being back at least virtually   in my old stomping grounds of san francisco  where i was an fbi supervisor for three years   terrific well frank you know the events of the  last four years have led a number of former public   officials who ordinarily would have kept silent  to write books and speak out former director jim   comey among them what prompted you to write this  book well first i have to be honest and say that   what got me over the hurdle of saying i would  never write the book um is the fact that the   institution that i loved and dedicated 25 years  to had been bashed for four years and that's okay   criticism of the bureau will happen on a daily  basis but for me it meant that the success of the   mission the fbi's ability to get the cooperation  of a trusting public was being negatively impacted   and for me it was all about that mission and the  success of it so this book says look not only   is what you're hearing from some corners not  accurate but the the difference about this book is   it puts up the the bureau as a leadership model a  template about how to perform with high degree of   excellence under high stress and you don't have  to spend 25 years in the fbi to glean some of   those lessons i've distilled them down into what  i call as you said the seven seas well the fbi and   its leadership role has come under some scrutiny  in recent weeks i mean your timing for this book   was impeccable right your book tour began in the  days after the january 6th in insurrection at the   capitol let's let's do uh what you call the hot  wash there let's let's talk a little bit about   what happened uh why why didn't the fbi couldn't  they have seen this coming or better prevented   the assault tell us what you think went wrong  yeah i've been calling this insurrection ellen   not so much a failure of intelligence but rather  a failure to act upon available intelligence no   one can claim ignorance on the insurrection even  armchair intelligence analysts at home were seeing   this play out on social media we were seeing even  within private and public domain talk of quote   overwhelming the capitol police for for example so  we learned in the aftermath quickly that the fbi   did provide intelligence concerns about violence  to the capitol police to the entire capital region   we've learned even that internally the  capital police intelligence unit prepared a   very concerning intelligence assessment for their  own use so now we have lots and lots of questions   and very few answers about why wasn't this  prevented um and it's layered and nuanced   um who was calling the shots if at all what higher  levels came in and said we're going to have this   insufficient security posture we need a lot  of answers well did the fbi live up to its   code in handling the intelligence that it had  should it have pressed harder well here's one   yeah a great a great question because on the  one hand this is a teachable moment for people   like me to to educate the public that the fbi  is not in the building security business they   aren't they aren't security guards or at  buildings however i'm very uncomfortable   with an fbi stance that says well we provided our  intelligence bulletins and advisories and you know   have a nice day good luck with that i i don't  buy that either so i'm sensing after 25 years   in that organization that other factors came into  play and i'm very concerned if in fact political   factors and pressure and influence perhaps from  an acting attorney general perhaps even from   the white house may have may have impacted the  degree to which the fbi could step in and say   the bad thing's about to happen and we're not  comfortable with the security posture well i mean   you're alluding to you know degree of  political interference there and uh maybe   some cultural uh impediments there that showed  that people weren't resisting properly to that i i am i'm also let's not um let's also not  escape or overlook the obvious you know as   they teach medical students sometimes a headache  is just a headache and in this case i see a lack   of legislation a lack of investigative tools i  see some very valid civil liberties and privacy   concerns where fbi lawyers and doj lawyers stop  agents from looking at social media posts that   might be simply an exercise of free speech i also  hear from agents even even this last week saying   look we we have tremendous challenges in terms  of differentiating between an aspirational post   some guy eating potato chips on his couch and then  a guy who's going to act out and execute violence   it is a daunting daunting challenge especially  while you're trying to protect free speech so   let's step back for a moment and you're talking  about uh a larger question of domestic violent   extremism something that's been with us it's been  it's been a phenomenon of scourge for decades you   you yourself covered it i think in your earlier  years you were investigating the ku klux klan   tell me what's new here what's different  this has been around for years what if   anything is different about this uh violent  extremism around this time is it social media   is it the fragmentation of groups what  do you see that's different yeah there's   two major differences and you hit on one of them  there's no question that the role of social media   was enormous in facilitating this with a speed  with which we've never seen in our history   before um there's a huge difference between a clan  meeting in the 1960s in the back of a gas station   and and a hundred thousand people all  posting plans and intentions and an echo   chamber that moves at the speed of a tweet um  huge difference and we're way behind the curve   legislatively um in the corporate big tech world  and in law enforcement on this the the the free   speech aspect is is almost i i don't want to  say it's humorous but when you're talking about   people posting by the hundreds of thousands their  intentions to to kill the speaker of the house or   whatever we're way beyond free free speech  concerns that that's not free speech we're   we're into facilitating engaging in violence on  a massive scale the other different thing about   this is we've never had a president who actually  served as a kind of insider in chief radicalizer   in chief and when you have that as a bully  pulpit you you have radicalization on steroids   you alluded to some of the challenges that the  fbi and other law enforcement organizations face   in combating this especially far-right  extremism uh yeah when and you were also   active at post 9 11. after 9 11 the fbi  gained you tools to fight foreign terrorism   and with the designation of foreign terrorist  organizations overseas law enforcement has   tools to to surveil wiretap investigate some  of these groups that aren't available to them   for domestic groups can you talk a little bit  about that as a challenge and do you see any   way around it or through it yeah we we need  to have this discussion as a nation and   and i i want to see this play out on capitol  hill as well so look the good news is we've had   we have not had a a terrorism attack serious  significant terrorist attack on u.s oil since 9   11. there's a reason for that the reason for that  is the fbi is at war every single day and has the   tools necessary so here's what i mean by that  not only is there an international terrorism law   that if you found if you're found to break  it send you away for 20 years to life   but but also with that package comes the  ability to designate groups and organizations   like al qaeda like isis like boko haram and when  that happens and you even trip into that group   and become associated with those groups you get  covered like a blanket by the fbi and it becomes   a preventive proactive posture so for example i  talk about the el paso walmart shooter a white kid   from texas in a chat room talking about hurting  brown invaders the language of the president   if you switch that young man over to islam and  you make his cause violent jihad and killing   infidels and he's associated with al-qaeda or boko  haram you have the fbi with court ordered wiretaps   on that chat room informants in the chat room  undercover agents will bump him at the supermarket   they will likely prevent him from doing anything  we have nothing like that on the domestic terror   side now ellen i'm well aware of the very valid  concerns about quote unquote spying on americans   for ideology and not for violence and i'm very  aware of the potential abuses of designating   groups look we just had a president who tweeted  one day i hereby declare antifa a domestic terror   organization there could be abuses to that if if  we actually had a way of designating a domestic   terror organization and and what i'm afraid  of ellen is that we automatically jump to the   uh you want to spy on americans discussion  and it it stops us from just passing a law   against domestic terrorism and so i'm i'm  saying let let's let's put the designation   of groups aside let's let's put that aside  and say does everyone agree that when when   we are when someone robs a bank we don't arrest  them for trespass in the bank we arrest them for   bank robbery a far more serious crime against the  government by the way for federally insured monies   and when someone commits insurrection at the  capitol we arrest them for trespass assault theft   of nancy pelosi's podium it's time to recognize  it as a much more serious crime let's call it   what it is let's call it domestic terrorism let's  have a law against it and let's avoid the uh first   amendment that falls i guess oh designate i'm  going the designation route for domestic groups   i think baby steps for now ellen and i i have  to tell you even having a law to point to   changes the dynamics so much when an fbi agent  walks into a u.s attorney's office and says hey   i have a i have a potential domestic terrorism  case for you i can charge domestic terrorism   that that prosecutor sits up and pays attention  when an fba agent walks in and says i've got an   assault case or a trespass case or i've even  got a guy assembling bomb making equipment   i have that all the time so you know let's treat  it seriously let's get prosecutive attention   on it and and let's put people i noticed look even  today as we speak ellen the department of homeland   security has just issued what a domestic terrorism  advisory about our own people they're calling it a   terrorism threat why don't we have a law against  it right i think they're warning about potential   violence stirred by people who are agitated by uh  president biden's election and inauguration so you   know um there were also in recent days protests  of in in portland you you saw those you heard   about those there's been some you know smashing of  windows or some violence on the left is that not   also a threat to uh to to public security what  do you think about about the threat of violent   extremism on the left i i am um i am neutral i'm  a neutral law enforcement officer meaning i've   in my career i've investigated and arrested people  of all stripes colors and political persuasions   and if you're a threat you're a threat but i i  want to i want to say a couple of things about   that one we are going to have there is a criminal  element in this society no matter what we do and   and we need to distinguish between a criminal  element and an organized coordinated group that   actually plans violence for ideological purposes  i'm right back to the definition of terrorism   which is the use of force or violence to coerce  or intimidate a government or civilian population   for the purpose of advancing a political or  social objective i think the latest that i'm   hearing out of violence in portland is it's  coming awfully close to that definition it is   hey we don't care who the president is we want  to send a message politically and socially that   things need to change that sounds a lot like  terrorism to me as well and so here's what i   say um i find it ironic i i go on i do a lot of  television and some of some of the tv show hosts   they their heads exploded when they started  shouting about the insurrection that the fbi   should have been all over this should have  prevented it right but the moment you ask them   so so you're okay with say designating groups and  organizations terror groups absolutely so so you'd   be okay with designating a group in portland a  terrorist group if they're on the far left no   oh okay so we we've got to work through that  because violence can come from all sectors if   we're not careful yes maybe it's an issue of  criminalizing the the action and the violence   and not the ideology i agree i agree um there  has also been criticism about the contrast in   the heavy-handed way in which law enforcement have  handled black lives matter protests and then the   relatively hands-off approach taken by the capitol  police in january 6th is that criticism valid   or is there a double standard what's behind  the disparity yeah you can't you can't be a   credible law enforcement professional anymore  and and pretend that the disparity in treatment   and security posture doesn't exist a true  security professional understands this   your planning and your security posture has  to be intelligence driven and risk-based   so let's look at this disparity insurrection at  the capitol all kinds of intelligence even written   assessments saying violence is coming soon and  even on this day that's a high threat risk based   on intelligence what was the security posture  wholly insufficient a bunch of police officers   in their normal daily uniforms no tactical teams  no hard perimeter let's go to the the riots over   the summer black lives matter excessive use of  police force and what was the the intelligence   um there's going to be some a bunch of peaceful  protesters who are upset about police conduct   okay what's the posture riot teams dhs agents on  the ground um rubber bullets pepper spray bombs   and so i see a disparity there and i have to ask  the question if the folks at the at the capitol   building on january 6 were a different color or a  different religion like islam would we have seen   actual uh shooting aggressive response putting  down that that riot i think the answer is yes well   you know frank as as head of the opr uh you  investigated cases of your other cases of agents   impropriety did you come across any cases  of agents improperly sympathizing with say   white supremacists or domestic violent extremists  no i'm actually pleased to say in large part and i   write about this in the book in large part because  of the vetting process that the fbi expends   tremendous resources on not only on who they bring  in the door but then vetting them continuously   throughout their career a lot of a lot of the  folks joining us today helen have no idea that   every five years at a minimum fbi employees all of  them are re-polygraphed and reinvestigated as if   they were getting hired all over again including  not just a credit and criminal check but knocking   on your neighbor's doors your the financial  analysis um your social media posts this is   an ongoing and expensive operation so i'm glad to  say that no i've i've not encountered that there   have been random um random comments misjudgments  um troubling statements you know off off record   about something and and those people are slammed  hard for that and made examples of that's the kind   of thing i write about in my book in terms of  preserving your core values as an organization   as a team as a nation there's a question from  the audience that's sort of related to this it's   it is are you concerned about how white  the fbi is it seems like it's time for   diversification yeah i'm i'm concerned on a  couple of levels and and this thing this issue   simply the bureau seems unable to get out out  of head of this i've been talking about this   and and the bureau's been talking about it openly  ever since i joined the fbi and and that is that   from a success standpoint let's put aside the  reality that diversity actually works that that   it brings different ideas and cultures to the  table we we hopefully all accept that i'm here to   tell you that you can't be a super successful law  enforcement and intelligence agency if you don't   look like the society you're trying to protect  so you know a couple of white guys driving around   in a van is a surveillance operation and so you  know it doesn't you don't blend in very well if   you don't look like america and and you you don't  develop informants and assets and get cooperation   from america if you don't look like america so  the fbi is is working extremely hard trying to   get the right people in the door who look like  america and bring diversity to the table but   you know we just we just touched on a topic ellen  that that is one of the roadblocks there which is   asking talented bright young african americans  to wear a badge right now it's pretty damn hard   it's a marketing job it's an ideology that has to  be a perception that has to be reversed and it's   extremely hard and then of course it asks them to  do it on a government salary when they can go to   the corporate world it's a challenge but they're  working on it there's also the gender disparity   in the fbi it they tried diligently to raise the  percentage of female agents um and it still isn't   where they needed to be and when you looked at  at the incidents of the last year or two the the   killings of george floyd and brianna taylor and  the the great uh controversy that has raised and   and the need for uh or calls for police reform  uh how do what do you think needs to be done   not another is surely not another just civilian  review commission right what how do we really   move ahead on this issue so first let me say this  and i've said this before the the the mantra of   defunding the police is perhaps the worst public  relations motto i've ever heard um what the phrase   that i use is reimagine the police reimagine the  police as as being what your community needs them   to be and part of that absolutely comes down  to funding a different way of policing and   here's what i mean my fbi career took me all  over the united united states you mentioned   it san francisco as well um and miami and atlanta  and washington and cleveland i had an opportunity   to work and partner with police departments around  the country and i have to tell you so much of this   comes down to the bottom line of budget by that i  mean you you want to recruit and screen candidates   who are less prone to default to violence who are  less prone to respond in a racist manner who can   prove that they actually have true friends who  are members of groups that don't look like them   that is expensive you're talking  about psychological screening testing   and you're talking about engaging members of  the public in the interview panels progressive   departments do this by the way get them get  citizen activists to do the interviews and panels   of police applicants and then the training  takes money i worked in one city ellen where the   chief of police came to me and said did i have  any extra ammunition in my vault to give to the   police department because their bullets were stale  and didn't go bang on the firearms range that's   that's how poor this city was and of course  we we help them but you get what you pay for   in a police department if you want to train people  to not shoot right the fbi training spends as   much time teaching you how to shoot accurately as  when not to shoot how to de-escalate verbally and   and something called shooter restraint as well  so that takes extra money extra training i don't   see cities funding that with police departments oh  gosh okay i'd like to uh touch a little bit on uh   on russia investigation you you headed up  counter intelligence uh for some time too   so this is right in your wheelhouse the fbi took  a beating particularly from republican allies of   president trump for its investigation of russian  interference and russian links to trump associates   was the investigation founded did the  bureau handle it in an appropriate way   following the seven seas and then overall has  political partisanship affected fbi processes   a couple of different questions there one was it  open properly and predicated properly thankfully   we have an inspector general doj report that says  just that it says the the inquiry was properly   predicated look if nothing else fbi agents are  trained to identify and respond to threats and   the folks who opened that investigation they were  responding to the threat of their intelligent   intelligence some of it classified at a high level  that the russians may have penetrated the campaign   of a presidential candidate it was properly  predicated but your next question was was it   properly worked and the question the question  there is um mistakes were made with errors in   judgment so i came out publicly and when peter  struck uh and his emails peter strzok was a senior   executive in counterintelligence who actually  ran the early days of the russia inquiry into the   campaign when i saw the emails and texts that were  coming out between him and fbi lawyer lisa page   and you were out by then you had left the bureau  so you weren't yeah absolutely i was on tv one day   and i said you know he's going he's going to get  fired and i got i got scorched in my social media   don't speak ill of anybody who's investigating the  president and i i said no you don't understand and   and this is this is my book you don't understand  i'm preserving the fbi i'm preserving the mission   and the core values and the public's perception  of the bureau he's going to get walked out of   the building because you can't run the largest  the most serious investigation in fbi history   and then and you're off time start tweeting  about how you can't stand the subject of the   investigation or he can't be president um that  that conduct from a senior executive can't stand   so good investigation solidly uh investigated  horrific perception um that's hurt the bureau   and and then you know jim comey also handed  the president an excuse to hammer the bureau   and to fire him this is mostly about trump  but comey and strzok didn't help you were   referring to comey's uh press conference in july  of 2016 when he cleared uh hillary clinton and   then but then criticized her handling of the  servers and security and then reopening the   investigation later and then closing it again on  the eve of the election because we didn't find   anything new here yeah look i knew that moment and  i and i i was texting with people in the bureau at   the time i'll never forget the press conference  the flags draped behind jim comey by the way   who is a man of outstanding integrity and good  intentions i please don't misunderstand me but   i write about this in the book because it's  part of the seven seas of credibility and   consequences and so he in that moment at that  press conference many of us cringed and realized   in that very moment he had politicized  the fbi in the eyes of much of the public   by by doing a couple of things one he forgot  about accountability to the attorney general   and he forgot about preserving the perception  of the fbi and didn't think three four steps   ahead about the damage it was going to do to the  institution and in fact it did and in fact we saw   him fired for political reasons which politicized  the fbi even more yeah and then you know   but on balance the investigation did reveal a  significant effort by the russians to interfere   you shouldn't lose sight of that do you  feel that the u.s government responded i   guess it would be the trump administration  responded with the appropriate level of   seriousness or did the topic become so politicized  that it was impossible to deal effectively   with a legitimate national security threat  initiative yeah we're so polarized and we're   sitting in echo chambers and we get our news from  only one source and so no one really understands   the gravity of what happened and very few  americans have read all 400 pages of the mueller   report and don't forget we had an attorney general  bill barr who decided to get out in front of this   pull the rug out from under special counsel  mueller and issue a four-page summary and   have a press conference where he decided to spin  this and the findings completely in a fabricated   fashion no no obstruction no collusion and that's  not true there was no criminal conspiracy found   there were ten examples of obstruction of  justice by the president provided by mueller   mueller was playing by the rules meaning there's  a doj memo that says you really shouldn't indict   a sitting president that governed his approach  bill barr came out and said nothing criminal here   can't do anything i urge people if you if you  really have problems with the special counsel   i urge people to read the gop controlled  senate intelligence report that is even more   damning it's more damning than the special  counsel report it says that paul manafort   the chairman of the campaign had an it had  a russian intelligence officer as his deputy thank you thank you for pointing that out now  um christopher wray has taken over from comey   as the director of the fbi he took over at a  turbulent time how do you assess director race   stewardship of the fbi and then just recently  president biden said he'd keep director ray on   uh you know not replace him what do you think of  that move what what's the signal it sends and do   you approve yeah so let's start with keeping great  on i am a huge fan of the 10 year term for an fbi   director there's a reason why some very smart  people decades ago said you know what the fbi   must remain neutral and non-political we can't  change out the fbi director every time there's   a new president because it will politicize the the  law enforcement and intelligence agency that that   we need to protect us so um absolutely he deserves  to finish out his his term and he's got six more   years left now with regard to his tenure so  far i heard a lot of people saying things like   uh i'm disappointed in ray where was he at press  conference right after the insurrection why hasn't   he called out the president et cetera i want to i  want to let's let's go back and recap some of this   fbi director ray has testified on the hill at  least twice where he's clearly articulated that   domestic terrorism is the number one threat facing  america and and then he said there's a subset   within that that is hate-based violence  that incurred the wrath of president trump   and from that point on ray was simply trying to  survive while running the fbi because he knew   that the alternative was to have say an acting  assist uh director who might have the name   rudy giuliani or sydney powell which would  be a disaster for national security so   he's both trying to do the right thing and run the  organization and he's trying to survive while he's   doing it the the idea that he should have come out  immediately after the insurrection and said what   i'm in charge when i i've got this um i i i i it  it further increases the risk he'd be fired in the   middle of a nice national crisis it has nothing  to do with him running the actual investigation   and it's quite likely that acting a.g rosen um and  or the white house had told him you show up behind   a podium you're canned we're putting we're putting  our own person in as director during the crisis   i have to say i my gut told me that was happening  the minute i saw the press say stand by a doj an   fbi press conference on the insurrection is  about to occur and i turn on the television   and they sent the guys from the field they sent  the head of the washington field office they sent   the us attorney from dc in that second i  went there is a problem he's getting gagged well uh i wanted to turn to another related issue  of with the bureau in the wake of september 11th   some have called some called for splitting the  fbi british style into two organizations one   that would handle criminal investigations and one  like mi5 that would handle intelligence encounter   terrorism and counter espionage issues would that  be a good idea here in the states yeah i have a   strong opinion on this and i address it i felt so  strongly about it i felt the need to address it in   the last couple of chapters in my book um i have  had people approach me already and say yep that's   it um fbi uh should handle just law enforcement  let's create a separate domestic security agency   to spy on americans and stop this threat and i  and i say okay go have a beer with someone at mi5   or or the metropolitan police in the uk or closer  to home go north to canada and sit down with rcmp   the royal canadian mounted police and ceases the  canadian security intelligence service and ask   them how their systems work they've got  a wall up like we had um before 9 11. and   literally i tell the story in the book my own  experience of of having a serious espionage case   where ceases could literally not tell the rcmp  what was going on and the delays and hemorrhaging   and damage that was done because each agency had  to separately investigate it couldn't talk to each   other and the fbi had to intervene and i became  the the official who told the rcmp uh you have a   spy your buddies over here can't tell you but you  have a spy so this does not work the seamlessness   and the speed with which we need to address the  threat only happens when an agency is wearing   both hats law enforcement power of arrest and  intelligence the fbi is that agency and throughout   my career ellen i've seen examples of drug agents  in the fbi who pick up intel from an informant   that a middle eastern terrorist is trying to  get across the border that a cartel is shipping   weapons to support a terror organization you don't  have that happen unless you have seamless um um   relations between in within one agency between the  criminal agents and the national security agents   sitting squad to squad in the same building we  didn't learn anything from 911 i mean that's   one of these issues right it's tearing down those  walls we tore down the wall between intel and law   enforcement and then even within law enforcement  agencies you can't have that and it's harder to   connect the proverbial dots if you are if you  aren't under one roof sitting together yeah   so um we're getting a number of really interesting  questions and one of someone from the audience   also just brought up a question that i wanted  to ask you is you may have heard today that the   proud boy leader enrique tario once was an fbi  informant uh quite a question or else what's the   deal on on that uh came out in a did you see that  came out in a um in an interview there was a uh   affidavit that said back in 2014 the fbi had used  him as an informant in some fraud cases uh he's i   believe you know denying that but what do you make  of someone like a proud boy leader having actually   been an informant for the fbi in the past i mean  is that a level of cynicism well so first ellen   i i have to ask you have you seen the reporting i  have i have not i'm reading just yes it came out   today in reuters and other uh new services right  so so not not having read it let me just say this   um and it should it should resonate with folks  fbi informants are not sunday school teachers   fbi informants are bad actors and so the the  notion that what six or seven years ago um a   proud voice leader would have provided criminal  information to the fbi about something yeah that   makes sense um drug drug dealers you know pimps  um terrorists i i've i had a terrorist as an   informant when i was an agent shouldn't surprise  anybody we got some great stuff about terrorism   from it so um i want to know more about what  happened next um if it's true that he was a valid   opened you know we have a file on you informant  um when did that stop when did that relationship   break off right far more news newsworthy if we  found out he was an informant two months ago   far more newsworthy but let me let let me say this  and and to the extent that it's breaking news here   here's your scoop you know that he was  arrested in the district of columbia   before the insurrection right for burning  a sign and taking care of like lives matter   banner taking a black lives matter off  a sign off a church in dc and burning it   and and overtly who did the arrest the  washington d.c metro police department   who actually orchestrated that arrest the fbi so  if anybody wants to say that somehow the fbi was   cozy with uh you know seven years ago with uh with  a bad guy uh maybe but they got him arrested in dc   how uh successful has the bureau been at  placing informants or undercovers within   these domestic far-right groups white supremacist  groups and um what do you think of that as a   you know tool to to to to prevent violence to  detect prevent you know make cases yeah you're   so you're you're getting very close to to home  for me that this is my point is that they're   constrained severely from doing this and and  sometimes for very valid reason i i don't want   an fbi informant in my backyard barbecue because  i'm talking about how i don't like a particular   politician right no one wants that but the there's  there's there's a problem with that because when   my backyard barbecue turns into militia training  with weapons in the woods and now my buddies start   talking about hurting somebody the problem is  the fbi has no way of getting in there until   something really bad is about to happen and  some bad guy raises their hand and look at the   look at the plot to kidnap governor whitmer in  um in michigan how did that in part come to be   found one of the militia members raised his hand  to law enforcement and said hey um you're not   going to believe this but even i'm worried about  these guys they're talking about killing cops   and and kidnapping the governor this is bad so  we're at the point ellen where we have to rely on   bad guys to come forward and say they're scared  of somebody so we've got to find the happy medium   here yeah can we look at social media posts  though and and look for uh indications of   plotting and planning of violence and then use  that as the predication for an investigation   where you can then you know try to place under  covers or or get surveillance so i say this   if if it's discovered that that a chat room or a  group or conversation is primarily about violence   or that even one person is clearly moving  the group toward violence i'm all for   rules and regulations that allow the fbi to get in  there but right now it's extremely difficult and   again ask yourself um do the american people  are do they want are they comfortable with   the fbi just kind of wholesale monitoring social  media posts first of all the resources aren't   there this the civil liberties free speech issues  are huge with that and i and i say um don't go so   far back in history go back to 911 go back to the  patriot act and remember that the fbi and other   agencies were collecting what was called metadata  on phone records okay so this is this is not even   close to monitoring your social media posts this  is just getting your phone bill right the fbi was   collecting your phone bills from everybody just to  store them so that someday if a terrorist dialed a   number they could go whoa you that guy called that  number six months ago there's a problem or we get   our hands on it terrorist telephone number and we  find that frank fagliusi called that two years ago   congress stepped in and said we don't like  that very uncomfortable if you're what you're   collecting phone records okay so now what are we  suggesting the fbi should watch all social media   how come they didn't catch these guys okay  are you really comfortable with that right   so we've got a question from the audience asking  what type of charges could come out of the capital   incident should we expect more charges and how  does the timing of current political events   factor in so um good news i've in the last  24 hours we've seen clear indications from   the u.s attorney's office that we're we  should expect to see much more serious   sedition charges um that's fantastic against  the organizers the planners the most violent   amongst the insurrectionists that's  encouraging we've all we're already   approaching almost 200 arrests by the fbi on  people in that building also i see the debate   going on right now right we're hearing word  that lots of u.s attorneys officers are saying   don't don't know if we have the resources  to to charge trespass to a thousand people   don't know if it's effective to do it wouldn't  you rather spend your resources on building   the sedition case the conspiracy case against the  leaders of this as opposed to people who wandered   in to the building and wondered how they got in  so i i understand that that's a healthy debate   um resources and and and complex investigative  charges are where we should be going with that   how do you feel about um you know just  addressing the actual root causes of this sort of   hate-based domestic violent extremism especially  that you know the white supremacists are on the   far right what how do we go about identifying  and then addressing those root causes   this is complicated we didn't get here overnight  i will say that we even didn't get here in just   the last four years i will say this the last  year the flash four years was a radicalization   process on steroids but it didn't start just four  years ago it started clearly back during the obama   administration when we saw record threats against  a first black president but it started way before   that racism and hate is a is woven through  the fabric unfortunately of our society so   it won't be solved overnight but i will say this a  couple of things um it's a all hands on desk deck   holistic approach that's needed law enforcement  is not just the sole solution to this in any way   people have been radicalized and now there's a  two-edged sword about silencing platforms taking   parlor down um silencing the president which  i'm an advocate for but let's understand the   flip side of this you may be forcing extremists  into further into dark recesses of the internet   they are now migrating to encrypted platforms  where law enforcement cannot see them and where   they may have had guardrails and and people  saying hey uncle joe i saw that facebook post   you are crazy stop that now uncle joe has  no guard rails and all he's hearing is more   uncle joe's talking about violence so this is  all hands on deck a kind of de-radicalization   process has to occur the biden administration has  got to put that in place some of it involves two   things exposing them to sunshine truth truth  truth harder harder to do when they're buried   on only one news source and then secondly  showing them there are personal benefits to   thinking differently by that i mean you  may not have voted for me joe biden but   does your kid need college would you like a  break on tuition costs does someone in your   child have health care problems that  i can help fix with a health care plan   would you like to stop being a coal miner and  maybe get trained on building wind turbines i   can do that for you if you hit them personally  hit them on the budget of their household   and show them some light you may start a  de-radicalization process interesting uh   do you see any links or do you have any concerns  about the degree to which foreign states might be   supporting uh some of these violent extremists  here or domestic groups in europe might be making   common cause with these here what what do you  think yeah i this is this is what i i headed up in   the fbi was the foreign threat and let me tell you  something vladimir putin was a winner in this last   election a winner for the last four years sowing  discord and chaos that's his number one goal   our adversaries and we do have adversaries  want to see us in total chaos and disarray   and and we're pretty much there and so i am  convinced that there was some funding look we   bob mueller indicted 24 russians including  12 card carrying gru intelligence officers   for hacking and social media propaganda they're  messing with us they're still messing with us   and the fbi has conceded that it has an open  investigation now into a thing like um half   a million dollars in bitcoin being transferred to  some far right extremists leaders just before the   insurrection where did that come from it was  foreign it was foreign based and larger they   have the u.s attorney in dc has conceded he  slipped up during a press conference and said   yep where we've opened a counter-terrorism case  and we're treating you know we also have opened   a counterintelligence case and i that that got my  intent that got my attention you you did you've   done what you've opened a counterintelligence  case into the insurrection there there's something   going on there explain to our audience what that  means to you why why is that um it means it means   they have reason to believe that there is some  foreign adversary that may have had something   to do with either fomenting and citing and or  funding or being present at the insurrection and   and wouldn't it would it be ironic if the people  who who who pulled off the insurrection thinking   that they were true patriots of america actually  had been duped and led to do it by an american   adversary wouldn't wouldn't that be something it  wouldn't have been the first time either right   no indeed no in indeed and look we had look at  one at one point ellen in the last four years   a quarter million people were following fabricated  russian intelligence accounts on facebook   accounts telling you how to vote how to  think who to hate that's our adversary   what i i also hear is that you know the  russians are kind of uh equal opportunity   um discord uh sellers i mean here they you know  maybe they've distributed or amplified far-right   uh ideology but they've also done that on the left  and they've done that over the years during the   cold war soviets did that so can you talk a little  bit about about that aspect as well of you know   yeah when i talk when i talk to people who  say look i'm i'm okay with putin and russia   because they supported my guy trump i i i see  that as a teachable moment i i then explained   to them it's not it's not about the how much  they're with trump it's about how much they hate   us as america and want to mess with us and in  a heartbeat they will turn on a candidate and   pick some other guy or gal so don't think for a  minute that they're supporting quote your guy and   that makes it okay um they also supported bernie  i we reported yeah yes you did yes yes you did so   every we have to have this gets to another point  in my book ellen and i know we don't have time but   i i explained in the book that never before  had we had to vet a presidential candidate   as a potential national security threat  and i point out how the fbi spends more   time vetting and background screening some a  barista in the fbi headquarters coffee shop   who gets a top secret clearance by the  way then we do vetting a candidate for   high office and it's time to rethink how we vet a  candidate and i explain in never before released   cleared information from fbi headquarters in that  same chapter this isn't just at the president   level as as an fbi assistant director i had to  confront a sitting member of congress at the time   and tell him a foreign adversary considers you  to be a snitch he considers you to be their asset   do you understand what i'm telling you the threat  is at all levels and we don't vet our candidates   as national security threats we can start by  demanding tax returns financial disclosures   and foreign business entanglements great so if  we only have a few minutes left i want to get   to some of these questions one here says do  you see evidence that the new administration   offers a chance to restore some of our democracy  and work together with the intelligence community   well i already see evidence of that because i see  true professionals with actual resumes being named   to certain positions at state at dhs  um in the cyber world at the pentagon   um at doj so i'm refreshed and then of course  we've already talked about how biden intends to   keep chris ray on for her 10-year term this is  very very refreshing and people ask me how can   the intelligence community and the fbi restore its  its stature and its place and its and and i say   here's here's number one way to do it the  white house can stay the hell out of the way   of the career professionals who simply come  to work every day trying to protect america   a lot of people think that the intelligence  community is watching every move we citizens make   is there any truth to these concerns all right  so i think we've just discussed this which is   um everybody asking the question after the  insurrection why why is it the intelligence   community monitoring everything we do why  why didn't they catch this and the answer   is because they can't they can't legally they  can't for because of the resources and i would   never suggest that they should do that i want to  live in a free and open democracy with free speech   so the answer is no look the fbi people people  think the fbi is this massive organization and   here's what i say to that the new york police  department nypd has 35 000 sworn officers   the fbi has 12 000 gun and badge carrying agents  so nypd covers the five boroughs of new york   with 35 000 gun and badge cops the fbi covers  the world with 60 offices overseas by the way   with 12 000 gun and badge people um please don't  please don't suggest that the fbi is capable of   reading everybody's emails or social  media posts yeah yeah in fact uh the nypd   may even have uh they probably have more  intel agents right right than the fbi   uh the the nypd has a impressive  intelligence division um that collects   without all of the necessary laws that the  fbi necessarily has to play by as part of doj   so it's quite the infrastructure and nypd has  offices overseas a lot of people don't know that   yes so so there actually are differing standards  for uh for for surveillance and for collection at   the national federal level than there are at state  and okay very true all right one more question can   you comment on how the fbi decides when to end an  investigation and issue its indictments if there   are loose ends with others who could be indicted  do they wait so as not to tip their hand so so   real quick this is a real um issue not just on  the criminal side of the fbi but on the national   security side which is a serious concern at what  point do you say the threat has become so real   that we need to move now on the people we've  identified at the risk of not wrapping up an   entire cell of terrorists or spies a very serious  question now with regard to prosecuting criminal   cases and getting indictments the u.s attorney's  office the prosecutors actually actually help   run that decision and say it's time to move into  into indictment and and put handcuffs on people   but it's the same working a drug cartel working  a a cell of terrorists working a sell of spies   when do you pull the trigger when is  enough enough when can you keep going   i will say this on the national security side  the goal is never just handcuffs never on the   espionage side it may never result in criminal  charges it has to involve identifying the cell   and neutralizing and deterring the cell that's  the success metric great so our last question i   guess is uh goes to trust in the fbi how have the  events of the last four years affected the level   of trust and confidence the american public has in  the fbi you spoke about that somewhat earlier but   has that changed do you think vis-a-vis the past  20 years since 9 11 and what's your your prognosis   for you know going forward here frank yeah the  reality is the fbi lives and dies by its brand and   its reputation and that comes down to what have  you done for me lately or how have you screwed up   lately that i mean it it's just a minute by minute  situation i can tell you this during the last four   years we didn't have the white house come out  and praise the fbi about any of the terrorist   acts it disrupted right major sex rings taken  down child exploitation nothing and i'm hoping   we're going to see more of that in the open so  the fbi can go wow they do great work on a daily   basis because all you hear about on the front  page is when the fbi screws up when they succeed   it's on the back page frank do you do you have any  last words or closing thoughts for for audience in   the minute yeah real real quick real quick before  i join nicole wallace on msnbc in two minutes um   and that and that is i chose as my last  chapter in the book the last of the seven c's   something called consistency and i chose that  because so many people are wondering how do we get   through what we've just been through is there some  other way we should be looking at our government   our democracy and i say this the fbi faces  unprecedented stress every single day and they do   it by not abandoning their core values but rather  by clinging to them their training their protocols   their code if we do that as a nation if we cling  to the rule of law the constitution three equal   branches of government we will get through  this just give it time and be that conservator   of the nation's core values well our thanks to  you frank author of the new book the fbi way   inside the bureau's code of excellence for joining  us today um and also thank you to our audience for   watching and participating live if you'd like to  watch more programs or support the commonwealth   club's efforts in making virtual programming  please visit commonwealthclub.org online i'm   ellen nakashima thank you and stay safe everyone  thank you frank thanks ellen take care everybody   you

Channel: Commonwealth Club of California

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Length: 58min 26sec (3506 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 18 2021