WASHINGTON, DC – The Federal Bureau of Investigation has come under fire since it was asked by the National School Board Association to track upset parents at school bad meetings in the same manner as domestic terrorists.
FBI Director Merrick Garland denied accusations that his agency was complying with that request, but a leaked memo this week proved otherwise.
According to the Daily Caller News Foundation, “The FBI created a “threat tag” titled “EDUOFFICIALS” to track instances of threats against school officials, according to a joint statement sent on behalf of the Assistant Directors of the Bureau’s Criminal Investigative Division and the Counterterrorism Division, which was released the day before Garland’s testimony and leaked by a Department of Justice (DOJ) whistleblower to the committee.”
The memo instructed local FBI offices to use a special tag to label problematic parents as domestic terrorists.
“We ask that your offices apply the threat tag to investigations and assessments of threats specifically directed against school board administrators, board members, teachers and staff,” the leaked FBI document said, with the purpose of helping “scope this threat on a national level” along with a “comprehensive analysis of the threat picture for effective engagement with law enforcement partners at all levels.”
Today, the FBI is under even more criticism saying, it’s nothing to worry about, those tags are the same ones the agency uses to track drug dealers and human traffickers.
“A tag is merely a statistical tool to track information and for review and reporting. The creation of a threat tag in no way changes the long-standing requirements for opening an investigation,” the FBI said of the leaked memo. “Nor does it represent in a shift in how the FBI prioritizes threats. The FBI has used tags to track everything from drug trafficking to human trafficking.”
The statement confirmed the authenticity of the leaked memo.