WASHINGTON, D.C. — U.S. Sen. Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming is one of nine Republicans in Congress who were spied on by the FBI under President Joe Biden as part of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s probe into the U.S. Capitol riot of Jan. 6, 2021, a document released Monday shows.
The bombshell revelation was announced Monday afternoon by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, who released the document. It refers to a type of phone data collection known as “toll analysis.” Grassley and Lummis said personal cell phones of lawmakers were targeted.
Lummis was informed of the document by FBI personnel at a Monday meeting just ahead of Grassley’s release of the document, a spokesman for Lummis, Joe Jackson, told Cowboy State Daily in a phone interview.
'Blatant Assault'
"I'm absolutely appalled that the Biden administration used the FBI to spy on the private communications of Republican U.S. Senators — myself included,” Lummis said in a statement. “This was a blatant assault on our constitutional rights as elected officials and a calculated attempt to sabotage the separation of powers.”
Added Lummis: “Make no mistake: this authoritarian, unconstitutional surveillance and attack on the legislative branch under the Biden administration demands immediate investigation and prosecution. Those responsible must be held accountable, and we must ensure this abuse of power can never happen again.”
Unredacted parts of the memo refer to Arctic Frost — the name of Smith’s probe of the riot — and the members of Congress who were targeted. The lawmakers are Lummis, seven other GOP senators, and one Republican in the House: Rep. Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania.
The senators besides Lummis are Marsha Blackburn and Bill Hagerty, both of Tennessee, plus Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Josh Hawley of Missouri, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, Dan Sullivan of Alaska and Tommy Tuberville of Alabama.
Barrasso Sees Abuse Of Power
The memo is dated Sept. 27, 2023. It says that an FBI special agent, whose name is redacted, “conducted preliminary toll analysis on limited tolls records” associated with those lawmakers. The names of FBI personnel who drafted and approved the memo are redacted.
“This is an outrageous abuse of power,” U.S. Senate Republican Whip John Barrasso of Wyoming told Cowboy State Daily on Monday. “Republicans will work with the Trump administration to investigate who is responsible and hold them accountable. We must ensure this never happens again.”
U.S. Rep. Harriet Hageman said everyone "who signed off on this illegal surveillance must be investigated, named, and held accountable."
“This is further proof of how Joe Biden and his administration weaponized our federal government, including the FBI and DOJ," she said. "While lecturing Americans about 'protecting democracy,' they were weaponizing federal agencies to spy on senators, harass citizens, and crush dissent."
Nature Of Spying
The Grassley-led Senate Judiciary Committee said the FBI “sought and obtained data about the senators’ phone use” from Jan. 4 to Jan. 7 in 2021.
“That data shows when and to whom a call is made, as well as the duration and general location data of the call. The data does not include the content of the call,” the Judiciary Committee said in a statement.
“This document was found in a Prohibited Access file in response to Grassley’s oversight requests. Grassley’s oversight exposed the existence of Prohibited Access files, a file system the FBI uses to limit access to certain documents by making some files inaccessible to most FBI agents,” the statement said.
“Based on the evidence to-date, Arctic Frost and related weaponization by federal law enforcement under Biden was arguably worse than Watergate,” Grassley said in the statement.
“What I’ve uncovered today is disturbing and outrageous political conduct by the Biden FBI,” Grassley added. “The FBI’s actions were an unconstitutional breach, and Attorney General [Pam] Bondi and Director [Kash] Patel need to hold accountable those involved in this serious wrongdoing.”
“It’s taken years to get records and advance my investigation, but what the public is seeing now demonstrates the importance of congressional oversight and whistleblowers,” Grassley added. “My whistleblowers deserve great thanks for what they’ve helped expose. None of this would have been known without them.”
The FBI’s Arctic Frost investigation was opened in April 2022, according to Grassley. He said it was initiated by “former anti-Trump agent Timothy Thibault.” Later it was turned over to Smith.
Sean Barry can be reached at sean@cowboystatedaily.com.
