The FBI Can’t Be Trusted to Vet Judges

Serious people of all political stripes should question whether it is appropriate for the FBI to continue to be the agency that vets our federal judges.

In the past 10 years, the FBI has brought itself into disrepute and disgrace, yet its false pride continues unabated.

One need not go back to the days of yesteryear to question the bureau’s competency and integrity.

Back then, J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI not only Red-baited, it denied that the mob existed and refused to investigate federal civil rights violations--all the while righteously blowing its own horn.

For years, the most glaring example of bureau misconduct was the famed Rosenberg espionage trial, where, in an attempt to influence the outcome and ensure the death penalty, Hoover had illegal conversations with the judge overseeing the case.

The FBI today continues to be an incredibly effective propaganda machine, having mastered the techniques it learned from its erstwhile paper tiger enemy--the Soviet Union.

Some recent examples:

* Ruby Ridge. On Aug. 22, 1992, FBI agents surrounded a broken-down cabin in northern Idaho and killed an unarmed woman holding a 10-month-old baby by shooting the woman in the head.

No legal consequences befell the sniper who fired the fatal shot, nor were his superiors punished for writing clearly unconstitutional rules of engagement that made the fatal shot possible.

* Waco, Texas. On April 19, 1993, the FBI stormed the Branch Davidian compound. When it was done, more than 80 men, women and small children were dead.

Though then-Atty. Gen. Janet Reno took full responsibility for what the FBI did, it later became clear that Reno had been duped by the agency into believing the actions it proposed taking had little risk.

* Wen Ho Lee. In 1998, the FBI caused the jailing--mostly in shackled solitary confinement--of Taiwan-born American scientist Wen Ho Lee.

When Lee finally got his freedom after nine months, the federal judge chastised the FBI, among other government agencies, for misleading him.

* Robert Philip Hanssen. In 2000, it was learned that long-time FBI counterintelligence agent Robert Philip Hanssen was a Russian spy whom the bureau itself had been unable to identify or catch and whose spying had resulted in a number of assassinations.

Once Hanssen was caught and charged, the FBI made sure a quick plea bargain was worked out so that the fiasco would go away quickly and quietly.

* Timothy McVeigh. The FBI, unconstitutionally and in violation of a federal judge’s order, concealed evidence from Oklahoma City mass murderer Timothy McVeigh that should have been available to his defense team.

Throughout all this, the FBI has been the agency responsible--using both retired and active agents--for investigating and vetting federal judicial nominees.

In that vetting, the FBI interrogates not only the nominees, but also their families, friends, neighbors and business associates. It gets their tax returns. It learns the most intimate details of nominees’ lives and puts all this information into its files.

The peccadilloes or idiosyncrasies of those headed for judicial office--such as the homosexuality of G. Harrold Carswell, the federal appeals judge from Florida whom President Nixon nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court--can be held confidentially, or not.

Once a nominee is confirmed and seated on the bench, just knowing that the FBI possessed such information could influence his or her decisions.

There is no legitimate reason to, and many good reasons not to, let the FBI continue to investigate federal judicial nominees.

It is too difficult to know how the agency might use the confidential information it gets. Its powers are too great, its mentality and institutional history too blemished and its competence and credibility too low.

Any confidence in its integrity is clearly unwarranted.

There is good reason to establish an independent, joint executive-legislative branch office to vet federal judicial nominees.

This would ensure that when FBI agents make their frequent appearances before federal judges to obtain arrest, search and eavesdropping warrants and to give testimony in criminal trials, these judges won’t feel an inclination or an obligation to do whatever the FBI tells them to do.