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Episode 203 - Abolish The FBI? (Patreon)

Published:
2022-08-21 23:26:01
Imported:
2026-06
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Content

Alex Vitale, author of The End of Policing and professor of sociology at Brooklyn College, and Alec Karakatsanis, civil rights lawyer and co-founder of Equal Justice Under Law, join Briahna to discuss how the left should respond to the new conservative call to abolish the FBI. What could be done from a left perspective, and is it more important to potentially stick Trump with a crime than to take down an organization that has long targeted the left?

Subscribe to Bad Faith on YouTube to access our full video library. Find Bad Faith on Twitter (@badfaithpod) and Instagram (@badfaithpod).

Produced by Armand Aviram.

Theme by Nick Thorburn (@nickfromislands)

Comments

Anonymous

Um, it’s ‘Alec’. And he founded ‘Civil Rights Corp’.

Drew McGill

Episode 79 of The DEBRIEF hasn’t uploaded yet. I listened to most of it when it was playing but had to dip before it finished and hasn’t been uploaded yet :(

Dez Martin

Alex K posts shit that truly melts my brain

Louis Waweru

If we could to understand why our institutions are almost always politicized maybe we can answer whether or not we should continue trying to be a country together. If institutions that are based upon trust are always co-opted by agendas antithetical to foundational points like civil rights, it’s likely they always will be because it’s so easy to abuse trust. Even though we have a branch if power only concerned with Constitutional rights it’s painful to say how that’s working out even on generational timescales. At risk of sounding fascistic, I do wish there were another independent power only concerned with civil rights but on the enforcement side. Or a judiciary where constitutional issues trumped all the bullshit ways to criminalize people that legislators encoded in US Code and the like. The DEA was mentioned in this episode and is a great example how extremely misplaced our trust in enforcement is placed, and how misguided and arbitrary our values are. But really, such an agency could exist if it wanted to right now, without creating something new. Which is probably an answer to the question I raised.

Jonathan Kadmon

Well that ended on a little bit of a dark note 😂. Still the ask of those progressive elected officials is and always was to stand up to their own caucus and leadership and even the White House if necessary and tell them to do their worst. Preserving their seats or committee assignments was never on the list of acceptable top priorities.

Anonymous
>>90062903

It's almost like they were elected to be Real Systemic Change, or at the very least, Giant Pains in the Elite's Ass, but they think they got elected to protect/advance their own careers and futures. Weird how that works.

Anonymous

I get frustrated when I hear Good Faith arguments constantly label Trump, DeSantis & Their MAGA, as Fascists who would have a fascist power-hungry govt. We ALREADY have a Fascist govt. International Corporations already control BOTH parties. Biden's Caregivers AND the supposed Good Guys & Gals responded to the George Floyd- BLM protests with MORE police funding. Respond to Jan 6th with funding the Capitol Police and their setting up nationwide offices (shouldn't Capitol Police just be in the Capitol?), that are exempt from public scrutiny. I'm on Brie's side - why aren't we using this moment to get conservative voters, most of whom are just as propagandized as Dem voters, to join us? If you think Trump is some sort of special evil, you're wrong. The Dems, Biden's Caregivers in particular, are ALSO Fascists Authoritarians. They are just more polite and throw a rainbow flag/BLM sticker on it. Blue MAGA are a worse threat because they LOVE the system and will do anything to keep the status quo.

C. Ries

The FBI and the wider security state is just as opposed to far right nationalism as it is to left wing populism. Most alt right guys hate “Feds” more than anything. They hate them because they enforce the beltway neoliberal consensus, which they see as too left wing instead of correctly viewing it as the stagnant status quo. I would say that the libertarian capitalist right wingers are actually less virulently opposed to the FBI since we all know the FBI does not threaten capitalism. I think we should be careful when getting into an alliance with the right on this issue because the actors on the right most against “Feds” are fascists and not libertarians.

Demented Avenger
>>90073775

If getting thousands of poor people out of prison means not putting Donald Trump in it, I'll take that trade. I'd rather have him in it, but I'd I'd throw a whole bunch of the political class in it as well.

Jonathan Kadmon
>>90080390

I'm afraid that's not accurate. In fact anecdotally I personally know of several White supremacists actually *in* the FBI. If you accidentally kick a haystack and three needles fall out odds are the haystack is lousy with needles.

Anonymous
>>90080390

I think the general rule is the FBI protects their white supremacists, and the CIA guards their pedophiles. It's important to have job security, if you work for the Red White & Blue. 😉

C. Ries
>>90080390

@Jonathan Kadmon I'm not disputing that, of course the military and law enforcement probably has a higher rate of white nationalists than average, but would you characterize those guys as high level people or more grunt level agents? Obviously the people running the agenda at the intelligence agencies are cut from a different cloth.

Ty Henry, aka Sports Droppings

The Cultural/Reactionary Right in Congress is dog-whistling because their cult leader got served a warrant. They have no interest in abolishing what the FBI represents, just instrumentalizing it to advance their own ends. I see no bill on the floor. Don't be fooled or distracted. Rania Khalek had the correct observation on this.

Anonymous

I think this actually posed an interesting question of how do we want to hold powerful people accountable. Because, trump because of the manipulations of his father has basically been evading taxes since he was born. What is the best accountability system?

Anonymous
>>90073775

This whole “Biden’s a fascist” narrative is silly. No, more police is not the answer. But if you’re working off of a definition of “fascism” that fails to distinguish between police funding under Biden and 1940s Germany, it’s not a very useful definition. If you’re worried about cop-corporate alliances f*ing with marginalized neighborhoods now, just wait till Trump Part 2 when right wing paramilitary groups start getting deputized and fat boys in pickup trucks go kristalnachting their way through those “unruly” neighborhoods.

Anonymous

Does anyone know if videos are still accessible? I only see option for playing the audio.

Anonymous

Idk, I really feel like Bree could have engaged with Alec here instead of the typical, mildly invalidating response of, "Well, I would love to hear YOUR ideas on that impossible thing you want to have happen, but..." As a public defender, I'm sure Alec had a SHIT TON of practical, actionable ideas in making change happen. I sometimes worry that Bree gets obsessed with these rhetorical "gotcha" moments happening with the political elite instead of focusing on strategies from the bottom up, just as Alec said. Alec and Alex were bringing up wonderful points but I feel like their potential was somewhat wasted because Bree kept going back to this idea of right-wingers somehow banding together with us on the left to abolish the FBI, when there's no reality where they willingly diminish the police state as it is largely successful in persecuting the left and marginalized groups. While Bree going back to that point obsessively was a tad grating, they were both wonderful guests and I'd love to see Alec in particular on again!