The whistleblower says she was targeted for retaliation
Former US Senate aide Tara Reade, who has accused US President Joe Biden of sexually assaulting her while serving as a senator, filed a civil rights complaint against the FBI on Wednesday. Reade’s attorney says the federal government sought to intimidate and harass her during and after the 2020 election campaign.
In a complaint sent to the Office of the Inspector General of the US Department of Justice, Reade called for an investigation of FBI practices that “target Biden family whistleblowers for exercise of their First Amendment right to free speech,” according to a press release by Dr. Jonathan Levy, her London-based attorney.
Reade also requested copies of all information about her that the FBI may have obtained “through unconstitutional surveillance, search, and seizure tactics” and to have her FBI file expunged.
In a letter to the DOJ seen by RT, Levy described how the FBI – and, in particular, its Sacramento, California office – allegedly began an “operation” against Reade after April 2019 “in order to silence and surveil her and if possible falsely arrest her for criminal activities.”
At the time that the purported FBI probe began, Reade had just made public that Biden, then a US senator, had allegedly subjected her to a “violent sexual assault” on the Capitol grounds in 1993. Though she had reported the incident through the proper channels, her case was “suppressed by Congressional investigators to protect Senator Biden and the records sealed,” according to Levy.
Reade was not “an agent or associate” of former President Donald Trump, whom Biden challenged in the 2020 election, nor was she sponsored by any political organization or made any monetary demands of Biden, Levy noted. The attorney also pointed out that there was no indication of her involvement in any criminal activity.
According to the complaint, the FBI launched its operation “for the specific purpose of unlawfully intimidating, harassing, surveilling, and discrediting,” as well as potentially arresting Reade. Among those allegedly involved, Levy named Director Christopher Wray, Special Agent Michael Catalano, and NCA1 Supervisory Senior Resident Agent Andrew D. Forristel.
The lawsuit demands “an investigation of FBI practices” that led to a whistleblower becoming the target of a federal grand jury investigation and a criminal probe in California, “even after she requested FBI protection from death threats.” The DOJ IG was also asked to investigate the extent of the FBI’s alleged surveillance of Reade, including her “social media, communications and financial accounts,” and to provide copies of all the records thus obtained before they are expunged from her FBI dossier.
Reade has sought to protect her reputation by writing a book and starting a podcast. She has also contributed a number of articles to RT about the weaponization of sexual misconduct charges and whistleblower retaliation, among other subjects.
Earlier this year, fearing arrest for “an ominous menu of kangaroo-court offenses,” she sought political asylum in Russia while visiting Moscow.
