FBI Withdraws 2023 Memo Linking Traditional Catholics to Violent Extremists; Fires Five Analysts Who Produced It

The FBI fired five analysts on Friday who helped draft a 2023 internal intelligence memo produced by its Richmond, Virginia, field office. The memo examined possible links between ethnically motivated violent extremists and radical Catholic views and was titled on “Radical Traditionalist Catholic” ideology. The fired employees included four intelligence analysts and one supervisory analyst.

Their lawyer, David Laufman, said the action is manifestly unjust, completely unsupported by the facts, and subverts standard FBI policy and procedure. An internal FBI review based on interviews with 26 people found that all individuals involved in the creation, review and approval of the product failed to adhere to analytic tradecraft standards.

The review concluded the memo failed to meet proper standards and contained errors in professional judgment, though it found no evidence of malicious intent by the drafters.

A separate Justice Department inspector general report released in 2024 summarized the earlier FBI review and found no evidence that anyone had ordered the analysts to link violent extremists to specific religions. The inspector general review also found no evidence that the analysts made discriminatory or inappropriate comments.

The FBI implemented corrective actions to strengthen approval processes for intelligence products after the memo was withdrawn under former FBI Director Chris Wray.

The employees involved in the memo were admonished. The memo appeared in a report issued earlier this year by the Task Force to Eradicate Anti-Christian Bias, a body created by one of President Trump’s executive orders. The Task Force report stated that the FBI investigated, monitored, tracked and scrutinized traditional Catholics who had engaged in no criminal misconduct.

The Task Force report also alleged a misplaced reliance on the Southern Poverty Law Center in the Richmond office’s analysis. The Southern Poverty Law Center now faces separate criminal charges brought by the Justice Department, which alleges the organization lied to donors and banks when paying informants to infiltrate hate groups.

The SPLC has denied wrongdoing and described the prosecution as vindictive.

The FBI declined to comment on the five firings. The analysts’ dismissals were first reported by MS Now.