Perhaps one of the most memorable moments of the House Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government hearing with FBI whistleblowers in May 2023 was when Rep. Linda Sanchez (D-CA) brilliantly decided to cross-examine Staff Operations Specialist Marcus Allen with...a tweet from "@marcusa97050645."
You see, @marcusa97050645 has (or had) "Marcus Allen" as his (or her, one shouldn't presume) Twitter name — not to be confused with the Twitter handle, which is unique. Thus, setting aside the fact that there are multiple "Marcus Allens" in the world, you or I — or even Rep. Sanchez — could have "Marcus Allen" as our Twitter name. And none of what any of us has tweeted should be imputed to the Marcus Allen who sat through that congressional hearing to testify regarding the very real impact of the FBI's retaliation against him.
Nevertheless, she persisted. Despite Allen's sworn assurance that @marcusa97050645 was not, in fact, his account, Sanchez attempted to play "gotcha" with said account's retweet of a tweet that said, "Nancy Pelosi staged January 6th, retweet if you agree." Instead of just asking Allen if he believed or agreed with that statement outright in an attempt to discredit him, she made an outright fool of herself.
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None of which is funny in light of the context of Allen's congressional testimony. Allen is one of numerous FBI employees who suffered retaliation after daring to question some of the agency's actions.
Marcus Allen who is an FBI staff operations specialist also had his security clearance revoked this month. Allen got in trouble for daring to send public articles to his colleagues which he said was part of his job for “situational awareness.”
“Because these open-source articles questioned the FBI’s handling of the violence at the Capitol, the FBI suspended Allen for ‘conspiratorial views in regard to the events of January 6th,'” the report states, adding that the FBI did not give him approval to seek outside employment during his suspension.
Not only did Allen lose his security clearance, but he was also suspended without pay, and virtually all alternative avenues of income were foreclosed to him pending the investigation.
As detailed by Empower Oversight President Tristan Leavitt, whose organization represented Allen, in a June 4 letter to DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz:
For 27 months, Mr. Allen and his family had to survive on early withdrawals from their retirement accounts in order to continue administratively challenging the FBI’s improper revocation of his security clearance. For 13 of those months Mr. Allen also waited on your office to complete and report on its investigation into the FBI’s abuse of the security clearance process to retaliate against him. While waiting for your office to complete its work and for the FBI to consider our appeal of his clearance revocation, the Bureau denied Mr. Allen’s request to accept other employment and even argued that his family could not accept charitable donations from the public because he was technically still subject to gift rules—although he had no pay and no official duties for more than two years.
Thankfully, for Allen, a settlement agreement has been reached, pursuant to which he's not only had his security clearance reinstated, but also been awarded back pay.
An FBI staffer punished for harboring so-called “conspiratorial” views about the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot has regained his security clearance as part of a settlement with the bureau — and won back pay lost while on ice, according to a whistleblower nonprofit that represented him.
Staff operations specialist Marcus Allen was informed May 31 that his top secret security clearance had been reinstated following his suspension over “security concerns” about his “allegiance to the United States,” a letter from the FBI’s HR department shows.
Allen has also now formally resigned from the FBI and withdrawn his retaliation complaints.
Following Allen's reinstatement, House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan (R-OH) issued the following statement:
The FBI’s decision to reinstate whistleblower Marcus Allen’s security clearance is a total vindication for a great patriot. Marcus bravely stood up to expose misconduct at the FBI, despite attacks from FBI bureaucrats and congressional Democrats. All Americans owe Marcus a debt of gratitude, and the FBI must also reinstate the security clearances of whistleblowers Garret O’Boyle and Stephen Friend.
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