Jim Jordan hijacks health hearing to rant about FBI 'spying' at Jan. 6 riot
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) went off-topic at a hearing on access to reproductive clinics to accuse the FBI of "spying" on Americans as they rioted at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
Jordan made the remarks Wednesday as the House Judiciary Committee was discussing the FACE Act, a law that protects access to abortion and pregnancy care clinics.
The Ohio lawmaker initially argued that President-elect Donald Trump's first administration had "weaponized" the government by obtaining records of lawmakers and their staffers while searching for leaks. He pointed to a Department of Justice inspector general report that found the Trump administration was searching for reporters' sources when it obtained the information about government employees, including Trump's current nominee for FBI Director, Kash Patel, a congressional staffer at the time.
Jordan then highlighted a second inspector general report that found Trump's Department of Justice had no FBI agents at the Capitol during the Jan. 6 riot. The same report determined that over a dozen confidential human sources at the riot were not authorized to break the law.
"We find out that there were 26 confidential human sources here in the Capitol," Jordan told the committee. "Well, some of them came in the Capitol. Twnety-six of them on January 6th. Seventeen went in the restricted area, four went in the Capitol, zero, zero were arrested."
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"Remember, confidential human source is a fancy name for spy," he continued. "Spying on Americans that day."
Jordan did not mention that the so-called spying occurred under the Trump administration.
"All this stuff happened," he said. "So thank the good Lord, we had a change in this administration back on November 5th."