This week, two weeks after President Trump blocked its initial publication, the House Intelligence Committee released a Democratic memorandum that works to counter the Republican memo that claimed FBI and Justice Department officials abused their powers in order to spy on a Trump campaign aide. The FBI does in fact often rely on informants with their own political or personal agendas. However, so long as the information gathered from such sources can be cross-referenced with and confirmed by other sources, these subjective informants are not themselves evidence of political bias. Nevertheless, Trump has been keen to portray the Russia investigation as a witch hunt. This newly released document is an attempt by Democrats to reassert the nonpartisanship of the House Intelligence Committee in the face of incessant accusations of corruption. However, the Committee itself, ostensibly an objective institution, has become split along party lines in the wake of the Russia investigation. Republicans on the Committee wrote a rebuttal to the Democratic memorandum, stating that the document only confirmed that the FBI had been politically compromised, and that the document was a shameless attempt to "undercut the president politically."

This sentiment was echoed at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) this week in Maryland. Republicans known in the past for their wholehearted embrace of "law and order" have fallen into line with Trump's anti-FBI stance. CPAC was, in essence, an affirmation and embracement of Trump and his policies. As CNN's Gregory Krieg stated on Friday, "From the paying attendees to the headliners on stage, CPAC's embrace of Trump - both the man and his politics - is complete. His enemies - the 'crooked media' and, still, Hillary Clinton - are their own." Even Wayne LaPierre, head of the National Rifle Association, spoke out vehemently against the FBI's "rogue leadership."

From the general public, however, Trump and Republicans in general are facing increasing agitation over gun regulation and the NRA after the mass shooting on February 14th that left seventeen Florida high school students dead. Trump attempted to use the shooting to discredit the FBI, tweeting, "Very sad that the FBI missed all of the many signals sent out by the Florida school shooter. This is not acceptable. They are spending too much time trying to prove Russian collusion with the Trump campaign - there is no collusion. Get back to the basics and make us all proud!" The tweet was met with widespread outrage for its insensitivity and blatant self-interest. Democrats are now arguing for more stringent gun regulations in the wake of the shooting, and even some Republicans, including Florida Senator Marco Rubio, have begun to concede that more laws need to be in place for the safety of the public. The NRA, however, is pushing relentlessly to stall any such measures. At CPAC, gun advocate Wayne LaPierre accused the Democrats of having a "socialist" agenda in their attempts to limit gun ownership, and even went as far as to warn conservative voters to be frightened of Democratic victories in the future. Despite the continual gun violence rampant throughout the United States, gun safety legislation continues to stall in the face of such pro-gun Second Amendment rhetoric.