ARGUMENT: POLITICIZING THE FBIADL Split Marks FBI Shift Away from Targeting Right-Wing Violence, Scholars Say
FBI director Kash Patel last week announced that the FBI would end its working relationship with the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). Scholars told Axios that the FBI’s split with the ADL is but the latest piece of evidence that under Trump administration the FBI is less interested or invested in investigating hate groups and right-wing domestic terrorism, focusing instead on investigating what it deems left-wing violence.
FBI director Kash Patel last week announced that the FBI would end its working relationship with the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). Scholars told Jason Lalljee of Axios that the FBI’s split with the ADL is but the latest piece of evidence that the Trump administration is moving away from targeting hate groups to focus instead on investigating what it deems left-wing violence.
These scholars told Axios that under President Trump, the FBI is less interested or invested in investigating right-wing domestic terrorism.
Here is what some of the scholars interviewed by Lalljee said:
· “Apparently, this is being thrown away for partisan political reasons,” Douglas M. Charles, a historian at Penn State University, said. “That can only be a bad thing in the long run.”
· Emmaia Gelman, an American studies scholar and author of a forthcoming book about the ADL, noted that the organization has worked with the FBI on conservative projects since the Cold War.
“The ADL can be politically confusing,” Gelman said, also referencing the group’s defense of Elon Musk after he came under fire for making a hand gesture that drew comparisons to a Nazi salute.
· The ADL has historically fed information about extremist organizations and individuals to the FBI, Matthew Dallek, a political historian at George Washington University, said.
“Kash Patel’s FBI and the Trump administration have virtually zero interest in tracking and counteracting the threat from the far right,” Dallek said.
Dallek called the ADL “one of the more effective nonprofits countering antisemitism in the United States,” adding: “What is different about the Trump admin is the degree to which it is exclusively focused on threats from the left,” Dallek said.
