Sen. Graham: IG Report Shows ‘What the Deep State Looks Like’

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), one of President Donald Trump’s most frequent Republican critics, said Friday that a government watchdog report reveals “what the ‘deep state’ looks like.”

It is a remarkable statement coming from a senator who previously dismissed that term to describe the unelected bureaucracy in America’s national security apparatus. Some people on the far Right even have fingered Graham as a member of the deep state.

But the senior senator from South Carolina told CNN’s Kate Bolduan that he was profoundly troubled by Thursday’s report on the FBI’s investigation of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s handling of classified information.

The report by the Department of Justice (DOJ) inspector general identified anti-Trump bias by five FBI officials involved in the probe of Clinton, the president’s Democratic opponent in the 2016 election.

“This gives a face to many what the ‘deep state’ looks like,” Graham said.

In the past, Graham has pushed back on Trump’s rhetoric about the FBI’s counterintelligence probe into Russian interference in the 2016 campaign and possible involvement by some of the president’s advisers. Graham in December told The New York Times that Trump needed to learn there was a difference between running for office and being president.

In May, he told The Times that Trump should “probably not” use the term “Spygate” to describe the FBI’s use of an informant to make contact with his campaign. The informant was not a spy, Graham said.

“I’ve been saying there’s not a deep state,” he acknowledged on Friday. “Then, I look at this, and I see the people who are conducting the investigation of one political candidate versus the other, seem to have a very — not just a political opinion — but a motivation. So that’s why we’re going to have a hearing.”

That was a reference to Monday’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing featuring Inspector General Michael Horowitz.

Graham told Bolduan that “the [law enforcement] institutions have been crippled.”

Bolduan was incredulous. “Crippled?” she asked.

“Absolutely,” Graham answered. “If you don’t believe the average American is gonna think that the FBI is far more political than they ever believed, that’s crazy.”

Graham called for serious reform at the agency.

“The FBI’s footprint in Washington needs to be reduced. There’s too much of a ‘Potomac fever’ attitude,” he said. “I’m shocked. I didn’t buy into this stuff, that all of these people are out to get Trump. There’s enough evidence now to prove to me that the FBI needs to be looked at really closely.”

Bolduan suggested that was a threat considering Graham sits on the Judiciary Committee.

“It’s not a threat, It’s a promise. [Founding FBI Director] J. Edgar Hoover’s spirit is alive and well in some corners of the FBI.”

“It’s not a threat,” he answered. “It’s a promise. [Founding FBI Director] J. Edgar Hoover’s spirit is alive and well in some corners of the FBI.”

Related: Trump Dismisses IG Report’s Bias Conclusion As ‘Ridiculous’

The IG report added new detail to what already had been known about the deep-seated anti-Trump hostility some agents harbored. The report highlights a text message from Peter Strzok — a lead investigator in both the Clinton classified information investigation and the Russia probe — vowing to prevent Trump from winning the election. “We’ll stop it,” he wrote to girlfriend and FBI lawyer Lisa Page, who also expressed hostility toward Trump.

Strzok also referenced an “insurance policy” regarding the election in a different text.

Graham acknowledged that the report had nothing to with independent counsel Robert Mueller and does not exonerate Trump in the Russia probe, which the former FBI director now is leading.

“But what did they find?” Graham asked. “They found that the people who started the investigation were completely in the tank for Hillary Clinton, hated Trump.”

PoliZette senior writer Brendan Kirby can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter.

(photo credit, homepage image: U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham…, CC BY 2.0, by Jim Greenhill; photo credit, article image: Lindsey Graham, CC BY-SA 2.0, by Gage Skidmore)