“While our standard practice is to not comment on specific intelligence products, this particular field office product—disseminated only within the FBI—regarding racially or ethnically motivated violent extremism does not meet the exacting standards of the FBI,” the FBI told The Daily Signal in a statement emailed Thursday.

“Upon learning of the document, FBI Headquarters quickly began taking action to remove the document from FBI systems and conduct a review of the basis for the document,” the bureau added. “The FBI is committed to sound analytic tradecraft and to investigating and preventing acts of violence and other crimes while upholding the constitutional rights of all Americans and will never conduct investigative activities or open an investigation based solely on First Amendment protected activity.”

Michael Matt"s Comment: That this FBI memo has been rescinded comes as no surprise. It was  based on a 2007 fundraising campaign by one Heidi Beirich of the Southern Poverty Law Center, entitled “Radical Catholic Traditionalists”.

Where The Remnant is concerned, I have successfully debunked the “findings” of that SPLC fundraiser more than once, and to the satisfaction of the Left-leaning news organizations that had initially taken it seriously, including City Pages and WCCO TV reporter, Heather Brown. The SPLC’s credibility has since been called into question by John Stossel, the Weekly Standard, National Review, Judicial Watch, among others.

At best, this FBI report is an honest mistake; at worst it is a politically-motivated witch hunt foiled by a whistleblower. If the latter is the case, then this is worthy of the anti-Catholic Know Nothing party of the 1850s.

The SPLC made headlines some years ago when domestic terrorist, Floyd Corkins, who had carried out a politically-motivated shooting at the Family Research Council, admitted that he’d gotten his target list from the SPLC.  Simply put, this FBI report is based on fake news. And although the SPLC has been peddling this fake news for more than 16 years, they have yet to unearth a single example of any violence or threats of violence coming from a traditional Catholic individual or organization.

At best, this FBI report is an honest mistake; at worst it is a politically-motivated witch hunt foiled by a whistleblower. If the latter is the case, then this is worthy of the anti-Catholic Know Nothing party of the 1850s, which provoked violent vigilantism, church burnings, and even the murder of Roman Catholics.

As a traditional Catholic newspaper publisher, whose family has been in the Catholic press apostolate for 150 years, I vehemently protest this reckless behavior, i.e., basing anything on the SPLC’s notorious hatemongering, and I encourage fair-minded Christians of all denominations to do the same. 

In response to the FBI’s about face, former FBI agent and whistleblower, Kyle Seraphin, tweeted: “The FBI doesn’t confirm information, but they confirmed this because they were called out, not because they would NEVER approve it. They approved it, and are embarrassed. This is the only way.”

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