Barbara McQuade

But since Watergate, it has been –

crystal clear that that is the way that prosecutors conduct themselves.

And so to see it used as a weapon in response to false claims of weaponization is deeply disturbing, not only because of my devotion of my career there, but what it could do to Americans who might disagree with this president.

This is such a bastardization of the rule of law.

You know, there's a famous speech that Robert Jackson gave in the Great Hall of the Department of Justice in 1940.

He at the time was the Attorney General of the United States.

He, of course, would go on to become

a Supreme Court justice and chief prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials.

But one of the things he said in the speech entitled The Prosecutor, which is posted on the wall of many U.S.

attorney's offices, is the importance of not targeting individuals.

but of targeting crimes.

And so if a crime occurs, you investigate and you charge the people responsible.

But if you instead choose a person and then try to dig up whatever dirt you can on them, that is the opposite of the way that the tool is supposed to work.

It is a way that it can be weaponized and a way that power can be abused.

That seems to be what is happening in the case of George Soros.

He obviously is a very powerful, wealthy individual.

He funds candidates and programs that support Democrats and progressives.

And so it's understandable why a Republican president might want to try to upend those efforts.

But one of the things that has been part of the post-Watergate norms is an FBI manual referred to

colloquially as the DIOG, which stands for Domestic Investigations Operations Guide.