Washington [US], October 31: FBI investigations have been slowed or stalled by the second-longest U.S. government shutdown in history, leaving the bureau without funds to pay informants or make undercover drug or gun buys, gaps that an FBI spokesperson said are putting national security at risk.
The FBI does not provide detailed public information about how its $10.7 billion budget is spent and it is not clear how much of the total has been held up due to the shutdown, according to five current and three former FBI employees.
The shutdown, now in its 30th day, has frozen FBI funds used for operational travel, such as when an informant needs to travel to meet a drug supplier or boss or another investigative subject, the sources said. FBI employees are also without funds to travel outside their local areas.
In response to a Reuters inquiry about the shutdown's effects on investigations, the FBI acknowledged its operations had been affected.
The shutdown has furloughed hundreds of thousands of workers, has interfered with the collection and distribution of economic data and has threatened to cut off food and education aid programs. President Donald Trump's administration has worked to find ways to continue to pay some law enforcement agents and active-duty military, but the FBI employees said that the bureau's operations are still not fully funded.
Democrats, the minority in Congress, have withheld their votes from funding bills in an effort to extend subsidies to the health insurance of some 24 million Americans.
Managing informants who haven't been paid requires "some massaging by experienced agents" to keep the case going, Brunner said, adding that this could prove challenging since many experienced agents have left the bureau over the last six months.
Last week, the FBI paid its special agents - a small fraction of its workforce - but it is unclear if they or anyone else at the bureau will be paid again during the shutdown.
Source: Fijian Broadcasting Corporation
