Over the past few months, the media have subjected the public to a barrage of opinions about lockdowns, infections, and the value of a human life compared with the livelihood required to sustain it. What qualifies as “common sense” changes by the hour; still, media influencers strictly police challenges to buzzy slogans meant to keep people afraid and at home.
Their cheap moral panic has turned the national discourse into a roulette wheel of grievance and threats that determines at random who is allowed to speak and on what terms. This toxic influence has spread beyond social media and cable news and into the halls of Congress, targeting ongoing investigations under the guise of protecting the nation.
This week, the Senate Judiciary Committee took the first steps in what will surely be a long look at the Crossfire Hurricane investigation. Throughout Wednesday’s questioning of former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, and Thursday’s debate over the “unmasking” subpoena vote, Senate Democrats made it clear that they are not, and never will be, interested in investigating misconduct at the highest levels of the criminal justice system.
The problem is not that they wish to speak out on the open rebellion against police brutality filling our streets, but that they leveraged the pain and frustration of the protesters to invalidate the committee’s investigation into the quiet rebellion at the Obama-run Department of Justice.
Even in a cycle as contentious as this one, their feigned inability to do their jobs shocks the conscience, especially considering that the committee’s investigation and subpoena are based on information that, in a sane world, would dominate headlines.
The Crossfire Hurricane investigation launched after Christopher Steele produced his now-infamous dossier; we later learned that dossier was based on information spread as part of a Russian disinformation campaign. The DOJ inspector general found that former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe lied under oath three times in connection with unauthorized disclosures and illegally leaked information to the press. McCabe has never been charged with these crimes.
Contrast this sequence of events with the public railroading of former national security adviser Michael Flynn. Flynn was charged with lying to the FBI under the obscure Logan Act, and prosecutors controlling the case withheld vital Brady evidence from Flynn’s defense. The lead prosecutor was removed after he was exposed for violating Flynn’s constitutional rights.
If this sounds familiar, it’s because 10 years ago, federal prosecutors withheld exculpatory evidence in their case against Sen. Ted Stevens. The two prosecutors who withheld that information are still practicing law at the DOJ, which makes it hard to believe that what happened to Flynn isn’t part of a pattern worth investigating.
Make no mistake: Flynn was targeted because he supported President Trump’s 2016 campaign, and he quickly became a victim of the double standards that drove the Obama Justice Department’s agenda. What happened there is outside of the rule of law — and this is the issue Democrats claim no longer matters.
Unfortunately for them, members of Congress were not elected to ignore politically inconvenient scandals. The events of the past few months have exposed the country to fear, boredom, loneliness, confusion, and now anger — but the lockdowns and protests that loom large in the forefront of our minds must not be used as an excuse to give liars and conspirators a free pass.
Sen. Marsha Blackburn, a Republican, is the junior senator from Tennessee.
