The FBI employee was fired on the first day of the government shutdown as Trump threatened more terminations.

FBI Director Kash Patel on Wednesday fired an agent in training for displaying a gay pride flag on his desk while appointed to a field office in California last year, according to three people familiar with the matter.

The trainee, who previously worked as an FBI support specialist in Los Angeles, received a letter — dated Oct. 1 and signed by Patel — claiming he had displayed an improper “political” message in the workplace during his assignment in California under President Joe Biden, according to a copy of the letter shared with MSNBC.

The letter cited President Donald Trump’s Article II powers under the Constitution to dismiss federal agency career personnel, a justification used in several recent firings at the Department of Justice and FBI. The terminations are currently being challenged in several lawsuits.

  • NABDad@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    While I think this government is loaded with pedophile scum and they should all be shot out of a canon into the sun, I don’t think this is a first amendment rights violation.

    If the person in question had been fired for hanging a pride flag in his apartment window, that would be a violation of his first amendment rights. However putting it on his desk in a federal office building is different.

    The federal government shouldn’t be seen as endorsing any particular view. Unfortunately, if some homophobic dickhead needs to talk to an agent, they shouldn’t be concerned about whether the agent will treat them differently.

    The scum running the FBI likely wouldn’t care if someone was displaying a Nazi flag on their desk, but they’d probably be forced to respond.

    Or maybe not.

    • snooggums@piefed.world
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      1 day ago

      Acknowledging people exist isn’t political. Regressives act like it is, but it isn’t.

      A pride flag on a desk is like having pictures of your kids on your desk.

      • NABDad@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        Acknowledging people exist isn’t political.

        It would be much a nicer world to live in if that was true.

        EVERYTHING is political, and we live in a world where fascists make existence a political issue.

    • zbyte64@awful.systems
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      1 day ago

      The comparison to a Nazi flag is absurd. A better comparison would be if an agent had a straight price flag on their desk. And no, the agent would not have lost their job under this regime for such a display.

      • NABDad@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        I wasn’t really intending to suggest it was equivalent. I was just thinking of something we could almost universally agree shouldn’t be permitted… but probably would be by the current administration.

        In effect, I was reaching for the absurd. If it was a free speech issue, then a Nazi flag would be just as protected.