This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Tuesday, February 25th, 2020.

I'm Caleb Brown.

How has the FBI done its job before and since 9-11?

Why did it become a domestic intelligence agency? And why does Congress need to rein it in?

Former FBI agent Michael German says the agency arbitrarily differentiates between foreign and domestic terrorism.

His new book is Disrupt, Discredit, and divide

how the new FBI damages democracy.

We spoke earlier this month.

When did the FBI turn into a domestic intelligence agency? What was it

before? What caused the change and what does that mean for the agency?

So after 9-11 the FBI and the Justice Department and the rest of the

National Security establishment tried to present the intelligence failures as a failure of collection.

In other words, that they didn't have information that could have predicted or

prevented the attacks rather than a mismanagement of intelligence.

So part of the solution to that in addition to creating architecture

around the mass surveillance and more widespread data collection

and investigative authorities was relabeling itself.

So the FBI said, you know,

counterterrorism was its number one mission and law enforcement was no longer the

primary function that in order to prevent terrorism they had to go out and collect information

proactively and become a domestic intelligence agency and began referring to themselves as that and finally at one point and I don't remember

the year off the top of my head but actually changed that in their website where they

...