In an op-ed piece for The New York Times, former FBI and CIA director William H. Webster shares his thoughts on both his experience serving for both the FBI and CIA and the precarious status of these organizations in the current political climate. Specifically, Mr. Webster voices his views on the Robert Mueller investigation and President Trump’s lack of trust in the judgment of America’s intelligence community.
An excerpt from the article:
Americans need to know that we are all still united in the pursuit of justice. We should not run down our own institutions, trivialize the impartial actions of our own grand juries, degrade our own justice system, or bully a free press for doing its job. We do so at our peril. The president should want this investigation to follow the facts where they lead and bring America the answers we all deserve.
I’ve humbly served my country all of my adult life. The proudest title I’ve ever held is one Americans share: citizen. In times like these, citizens have a duty — to serve, and to speak up. Robert Mueller is doing his duty. We need to do ours. When I was sworn in as director of the F.B.I., I said we would “do the work the American people expect of us in the way the Constitution demands of us.” That means defending values like truth, justice and civility, because the idea of an America united by the rule of law is too important to lose.
Mr. Webster served as United States attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri from 1960 to 1961. In 1970, he was appointed a judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri and in 1973 was elevated to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. During his service on the bench, he was Chairman of the Judiciary Conference Advisory Committee on the Criminal Rules and was a member of the Ad Hoc Committee on Habeas Corpus and the Committee of Court Administration. He resigned on February 23, 1978 to become Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, where he served for nearly a decade before moving on to lead all foreign intelligence agencies of the United States as CIA Director.
Read the full article here.