EXCLUSIVE - The nation's top conservative think tank is publishing a blueprint for a possible 2024 Republican administration to overhaul the Justice Department and FBI, which recent surveys show have lost the public trust and are seen as agencies that are "too political, corrupt, and not to be trusted."
The Heritage Foundation has drafted a policy book that includes input from more than 50 conservative organizations and is designed to give an incoming president a 180-day playbook of policy changes – including a "high priority" overhaul of DOJ and FBI. That recommendations are part of the group's Project 2025: Presidential Transition Project.
"While it is true — as with other federal departments and agencies — that there are committed career personnel across the Department who perform their duties faithfully and with the best intentions… the Department has become a bloated bureaucracy with a critical core of personnel who are infatuated with the perpetuation of a radical liberal agenda upon the American people — and the defeat of political enemies," according to the document, which was reviewed exclusively by Fox News Digital.
"It has become a cabinet-level department whose leadership appears to care more about how they are perceived in the next Politico or Washington Post article, or how any number of radical leftist organizations perceive their actions, than with doing justice and advancing the national interest for the American people," it said.
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"Anything other than a top-to-bottom overhaul will only further erode the trust of significant portions of the American people and, in turn, harm the very fabric that holds together our constitutional republic," Heritage recommended.
Gene Hamilton, general counsel of America First Legal and former counselor to Attorney General William Barr, is the lead author of the chapter. Hamilton says the goal of the document is to "ensure that the next conservative administration understands the enormous task ahead of it at the Department of Justice — the need for massive reforms — and is equipped with the policies that will help it succeed."
"The DOJ chapter is very much focused on returning the department to its original glory but also recognizing the need for further improvements," Hamilton told Fox News Digital. He said that means "not only restoring the integrity of the FBI and ensuring accountability for the Department’s radical actions over the last few years, but also combating violent crime, defending the rule of law while also addressing rule of law deficiencies in jurisdictions riddled with crime, restoring the Department’s focus on immigration, and so much more."
Hamilton said the project models what the Heritage Foundation has produced for many administrations over many years, but this edition includes more "bold" recommendations.
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The document suggests that the next administration should at a minimum "conduct a review of all major active investigations and activities ongoing at the FBI and stop anything unlawful or contrary to the national interest."
It recommends that the FBI should eliminate its Office of Legal Counsel.
"The FBI is bloated. For example, few Americans know that the FBI maintains a core of 300-something attorneys within its Office of General Counsel, an office that has been involved in some of the FBI’s most damaging recent scandals," the document said. "Moving legal review outside the FBI will serve a crucial check on an agency that has recently pushed past legal boundary after legal boundary."
Another recommendation is to change the 10-year limit for FBI directors and allow sitting presidents to install a new political appointee once they take office.
"To ensure prompt political accountability and to rein in perceived or actual abuses, the next conservative administration should seek a legislative change to align the FBI Director’s position with that of all other major departments and agencies," the document said.
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It added that disciplinary measures should be enforced for career attorneys or anyone who is attempting to subvert the president's agenda.
"The next conservative administration should issue guidance to ensure litigation decisions are consistent with the President’s agenda and the rule of law. Consistent with this, the Department’s leadership must be prepared to impose appropriate disciplinary action as circumstances arise," the document said.
More broadly, Heritage argued that the FBI needs "a hard reset" on the appropriate scope of its legitimate activities, like communication with social media companies on what posts to censor.
"The Department needs a hard firewall between its legitimate activities (monitoring online activity for potential threats in its mission space, looking at social media profiles for evidence of intent or other criminal activity, etc.) and those in which it must not engage (asking or demanding public forums or publishers to remove material based on the content and/or viewpoints expressed or itself censoring speech)," the document said.
