In response to Dave Johnson’s July 20 letter to the editor, “Biased FBI coverage hurts our democracy” (Page A10):

I can only ask: “Are you kidding? And if so, whom are you kidding?”

As with many supporters of Donald Trump, the greatest hyperbole being generated is Mr. Johnson’s while he espouses a line of thinking that demonstrates a curious inability to tell fact from fiction.

FBI agent Peter Strzok’s texting his dislike of Trump with his girlfriend was his business and did not actually affect his work as a government employee. While it was inappropriate, causing him to be removed from the investigative team, it was not a crime of any sort. To be clear, he has not been charged with anything, except maybe poor judgment. He could have generated enormous havoc for Trump had he leaked some of the juicy tidbits the FBI was in possession of – he did not.

I might also point out that the FBI’s Russia investigation, contrary to Republican assertions, was tripped off not by a dossier compiled by former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele, but by a Trump operative bragging to a foreign diplomat that the Russians were providing the Trump campaign with dirt on the Hillary Clinton campaign. That diplomat was sufficiently concerned by what he heard that he reported the incident to the FBI.

The so-called Strzok hearing was just another tawdry spectacle in desperate Republican tactics – remember the eight Republican-driven Benghazi hearings that accused Hillary Clinton of various crimes but never actually provided a shred of evidence? I wonder how many millions of dollars these charades by a party that claims to be so financially conservative have cost American taxpayers.

Richard McWilliams

Yarmouth