FBI Agents Repeatedly Sought Pretextual Investigations to Target Trump, Revealing Deep-State Weaponization
Source: Margot Cleveland. "Deep State Cited Wikipedia To Try To Launch Trump Investigation." September 21, 2026. thefederalist.com
The Gist
The author argues that newly released documents show FBI agents repeatedly tried to manufacture flimsy investigations against Trump (and others), even citing Wikipedia as 'evidence,' while burying a report that would have debunked a false Trump-Russia conspiracy theory. She frames this as proof of a coordinated 'Deep State' effort to weaponize the FBI against Trump.
Conclusion
The newly released Grassley documents demonstrate that FBI agents engaged in a sustained, coordinated effort to weaponize the Bureau against Trump by manufacturing or pursuing baseless investigations, using flimsy or fraudulent justifications, and this pattern reflects a deeper 'Deep State' bias within the FBI that persists in official records.
Premises
- FBI agent Walter Giardina attempted seven times in four weeks to join the Crossfire Hurricane investigation, contradicting official claims that agents cannot choose their cases.
- Giardina pushed to open a campaign finance investigation against Trump based on weak justification, including citing a Wikipedia article about a bank as supporting evidence.
- FBI Director Kash Patel testified that the Bureau 'made up' the Round River classification, which was used to improperly discredit negative Hunter Biden information.
- Multiple agents (Giardina, Thibault, Gounaud) collaborated across years to draft and forward investigative steps targeting Trump, with Thibault appearing to take credit for work actually done by Gounaud.
- Agent Kevin Gounaud separately pursued a facially frivolous criminal investigation into Elon Musk over a routine workplace email, suggesting a broader pattern of politically motivated investigative overreach.
- A PwC report definitively debunking the Alfa Bank-Trump hoax was sent to the FBI in March 2017 but mysteriously never appears in later testimony, the Durham report, or the Sussmann trial record, suggesting selective suppression of exculpatory evidence.
Assumptions
- Repeated attempts by agents to join or initiate Trump-related investigations, absent additional context, indicate improper political motivation rather than legitimate investigative interest.
- The absence of a document (the PwC report) from later official records necessarily indicates suppression rather than simple oversight, redundancy, or irrelevance.
- Citing a source like Wikipedia in an internal email is inherently indicative of weak or illegitimate investigative predicate, rather than a minor informal reference among agents gathering background context.
- The various disparate incidents (Giardina's campaign finance push, Round River, Gounaud's Musk email, the Alfa Bank PwC report) are all connected manifestations of a single overarching 'Deep State' agenda rather than isolated incidents of individual agent behavior.
- Grassley's selectively released documents provide a complete and unbiased picture of the FBI's internal deliberations.