On Friday’s broadcast of PBS’ “Washington Week,” POLITICO Senior White House Reporter Josh Gerstein stated that “the backlash that Comey is feeling for interfering, in their view, of some of these agents, with the Clinton investigations, I think you have to look at what is the likely political outlook of a lot of the FBI agents. And when you see that they have a 67 percent white male workforce, an 80 percent white workforce…he may be facing it as a kind of crisis that’s contributing to the difficulties finding and managing these very politically sensitive investigations.”
Gerstein said the FBI’s demographics “could be a factor here. I mean, the backlash that Comey is feeling for interfering, in their view, of some of these agents, with the Clinton investigations, I think you have to look at what is the likely political outlook of a lot of the FBI agents. And when you see that they have a 67 percent white male workforce, an 80 percent white workforce, that Comey himself has complained that the numbers have been sliding in a more white male direction than they’ve been in the past. He’s called it a crisis. I think he was thinking more about them investigating crimes on the street, but now he may be facing it as a kind of crisis that’s contributing to the difficulties finding and managing these very politically sensitive investigations.”
He added that Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump would win among FBI employees “because their workforce right now doesn’t look like America. And Comey’s acknowledged that he knows that’s a big problem for them in the long run. I don’t think he realized what a problem it would be for him in the short run.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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