Power Line's excellent John Hinderaker has a careful summary of what the FBI did and did not do on Jan. 6. Whether you believe it or not, I'm inclined to do so. It's based on a report done by a Michael Horowitz, the DOJ's IG.
Reading between the lines we see that in addition to 5 individuals the FBI knew were in the crowd, there were another 23 confidential informants who decided on their own to go to the Capitol.
Of these 23 informants who traveled to DC on their own with no assignment, 13 notified their FBI agent handler, and 10 did not. Of the 13 who notified their agent handler, the Washington Field Office of the FBI (WFO) was informed of just 2. Of the 26 total informants present during the January 6th events, the WFO was aware of 5 – the 3 on active assignment and 2 of the 23 who were there on their own accord.
Though not Federal employees with civil service protections, all of these c.i. individuals work for the FBI, either as gig contractors or to stay out of jail. All of them want to impress their handler-boss, in hopes of a bonus, further gigs or a "clean sheet."
They were tasked to surveil and report on suspicious individuals and groups the misdeeds of which interested the FBI. Reporting those targeted individuals or groups were behaving peacefully, lawfully wins no prizes. It suggests the FBI is wasting money on the c.i., the subject or both.
Let's understand what "with no assignment" means. It means there is no documentary record showing the. c.i.s were ordered to go to the Capitol by the FBI.
That's because they were still under continuing orders to stick to their targets. They followed those continuing orders to stay close to their targets and tagged along.
11 of 13 handlers who knew in advance chose not to tell the Bureau what their c.i. was doing. That suggests the Bureau was copacetic with their attendance.
The other 10 c.i.s understood a "stick to your target" mission obviously included going to the Capitol and didn't bother to tell their handlers.
What are the odds that some number of the 23 were active inciters of the rioters, either to maintain their cover or to create juicier gossip to report to the Bureau? I'd estimate those odds are excellent.
The Bureau maintains "deniability" in this fashion. Any c.i. misdeeds were their own bad choices, not FBI orders.
COTTonLINE translation of the above: Horowitz told a carefully curated version of the truth. He left out the most obvious part.
The FBI builds cases leading to convictions; when successful those are "wins" in Bureau culture, and would improve the handler’s outcomes and therefore those of the c.i.s. The worse the crime, the longer the sentence, the bigger the win.
It would seem FBI gig employees, who dissemble for a living, were structurally encouraged to make the situation worse. The surprise would be if few of them did that.
