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Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, today, I come to the floor to speak about a favorite topic that my friends know I am proud of, protecting whistleblowers and the roles that they play in government.
I have long held that government oversight can't be done without the patriotic work of whistleblowers. Even Department and Agency heads need whistleblowers to know what is really going on in their respective Departments and Agencies.
I tell people that come to my office before their Senate confirmation that whether you are in a very small number of employees Agency or, you know, hundreds of thousands of employees in our Agency, you are at the top; you can't know what is going on at the bottom. And you need to listen to whistleblowers, and they usually come forward with very important information.
When they don't get that respect from the Department heads, they usually end up coming to the Congress, and many of them come to the office of this Senator.
Just this year, to show you the importance of whistleblowers, I made records public, exposing the political origin of Arctic Frost. Arctic Frost is the case that ultimately became one of Jack Smith's cases against President Trump. Anti-Trump FBI agents and Department of Justice prosecutors started Arctic Frost.
Based on even more records that I have made public, those very same anti-Trump FBI agents were involved in the investigation and prosecution of Peter Navarro, now serving with President Trump in the White House, like he did in the first Trump administration. Those agents that took on Peter Navarro were Assistant Special Agent in Charge Thibault and Special Agent Walter Giardina.
Whistleblowers have also disclosed to me that J.P. Cooney wanted to potentially open yet another case on Trump. J.P. Cooney was Jack Smith's deputy. Allegedly, Cooney wanted to use compulsory process to obtain more information. He improperly based that desire to do so, in large part, on partisan news outlets.
And guess who was included in the communication about the new case against Trump? That same person's name shows up, Special Agent Walter Giardina. I will have more to speak on that matter later.
Whistleblowers have told me that Special Agent Giardina openly stated his desire to investigate Trump, even if it meant false predication.
I have been able to make all these records publicly available because of brave, patriotic whistleblowers. They are patriots to the highest order. And a lot of this information that I received from whistleblowers wouldn't have been made available or even known that it existed without the help of these whistleblowers.
And because of those whistleblowers, it is now an absolute fact that these cases against President Trump and his associates were politically motivated. My investigative work won't rest. There will be much more coming from this Senator.
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