Timothy Snyder: The Trauma of 2016 (spy scandal, part 2)

[Nevilledog]

https://snyder.substack.com/p/the-trauma-of-2016-spy-scandal-part?utm_campaign=post

The McGonigal spy scandal brings with it the trauma of 2016. Russian support for Trump put us on this timeline: the one with the covid deaths, the Putin worship, the coup attempt, the Big Lie. But the enduring source of pain, I think, is our half-awareness that this did not have to happen, that we could have done better in 2016, that our institutions let us down. This is hard to face, but must be faced; and the arrest of FBI counterintelligence specialist Charles McGonigal gives us a chance.

An outrage played itself out before our eyes in 2016: a foreign country tried to choose our president. Too many journalists convinced themselves that Russia’s operation wasn't real, or didn't matter. People who wrote early on the Russian influence campaign, such as myself and Frank Foer, were well beyond the mainstream. Some of the people in law enforcement who should have been looking at Russia's operation not only looked away, but helped others to look away: I mean, in particular, important officials within the FBI.

One of those FBI officials might have been McGonigal, who was arrested on 23 January. He is accused of taking payments from a foreign actor while employed at the New York office, and then after his retirement illegally working for a Russian oligarch. If these charges prove true, it seems a bit unlikely that they would have been isolated incidents. If he took money from other foreign actors while employed by the FBI, did he take money from Russians then? If he took money from Russians after leaving the FBI, did he do so earlier?

McGonigal arrived to run counterintelligence in the FBI's New York bureau during the most consequential month of contemporary American history, October 2016, at the very moment when actions taken by Russians and by FBI officials gave Trump the edge over Clinton. Up to that point, McGonigal had been in charge of cyber counterintelligence at the FBI main office. In both of his jobs in 2016, he was in a position to expose Russia's operation for Trump, something he did not do. He was also in a position to harm his country -- and it is reasonable now to ask (as Craig Unger has done) whether he did so. In this connection, it is also reasonable to ask whether McGonigal and colleagues knowingly spun journalists away from the Russia story.

*snip*


Link to part 1 for those who missed it:

The Specter of 2016

https://snyder.substack.com/p/the-specter-of-2016

[Nevilledog]

2. Maybe? I don't remember specifically.

I have seen him tweeting about McGonigal, but not giving other specifics.

[Nevilledog]

5. I'm listening to a podcast called Will Be Wild

They talked to a Black FBI agent who left during the Trump years because of a Trumpian shift in the agency. I'm only on the third episode, but it's really good so far.

[FakeNoose]

3. Thanks for this - I'm following this story

Also I want to read Tim Snyder's book "The Road to Unfreedom."

[Scrivener7]

7. And all of it continues today.

[Fiendish Thingy]

8. This is a BFD

Let’s hope the media doesn’t ignore it this time.