WASHINGTON: The FBI ordered agents on Monday to devote more time to immigration enforcement and scale back investigating white-collar crime, four people familiar with the matter told Reuters, as the Justice Department issued new guidance on what white-collar cases will be prioritized.
In a series of meetings, FBI agents were told by their field offices they would need to start devoting about one third of their time to helping the Trump administration crack down on illegal immigration.
Pursuing white-collar cases, they were told, will be deprioritized for at least the remainder of 2025, said the people, who requested anonymity to discuss private conversations.
Reuters could not immediately determine how many field offices were informed of the change, or whether it would apply to agents across the country.
An FBI spokeswoman did not respond to a request for comment.
The orders came on the same day that Matthew Galeotti, the head of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, issued new guidance to prosecutors that scales back the scope of white-collar cases historically pursued by the department and orders prosecutors to “minimize the length and collateral impact” of such investigations.
Immigration enforcement has largely not been the purview of the Justice Department’s law enforcement agencies in the past.
But as President Donald Trump has stepped up an immigration crackdown, thousands of federal law enforcement officials from multiple agencies have been enlisted to take on new work as immigration enforcers, pulling crime-fighting resources away from other areas.
Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi have also previously announced they will scale back efforts to prosecute certain kinds of white-collar offenses, including public corruption, foreign bribery, kleptocracy and foreign influence.
As part of those efforts, the Criminal Division has also been reviewing corporate monitorships that companies were required to install as a condition of settling criminal cases. Several of them have since been ended early, while others have continued.
In Monday’s memo, Galeotti laid out the categories of cases that will be prioritized to include health care fraud, trade and customs fraud, elder securities fraud, complex money laundering including “Chinese Money Laundering Organizations,” and cases against financial gatekeepers who enable terrorists, transnational criminal organizations and cartels, among others.
He said the department will also update its whistleblower award pilot program to encourage tips on cases that lead to forfeiture, such as those involving cartels and transnational criminal organizations, violations of federal immigration law, corporate sanctions offenses, procurement fraud, trade, tariff and customs fraud, and providing material support to terrorists.
The memo also instructs prosecutors to carefully consider whether corporate misconduct “warrants federal criminal prosecution.”
“Prosecution of individuals, as well as civil and administrative remedies directed at corporations, are often appropriate to address low-level corporate misconduct and vindicate US interests,” the memo says.
It also orders prosecutors to only require companies to hire independent monitors if they cannot be expected to implement a corporate compliance program “without such heavy-handed intervention.”
FBI ordered to prioritize immigration, as DOJ scales back white collar cases
https://arab.news/2uv9g
FBI ordered to prioritize immigration, as DOJ scales back white collar cases
- Field offices tell FBI agents to scale up on immigration enforcement and deprioritize white collar cases
- Criminal Division issues new guidance to prosecutors that narrows the scope of white collar enforcement efforts
Israel is risking global security, warns Somali Information Minister
- Tel Aviv’s actions boost terror groups, Daud Aweis Jama tells Arab News in exclusive interview
- He accuses Tel Aviv of wanting to relocate Palestinians from Gaza to region
RIYADH: Israel’s recognition of Somaliland and its presence in the region risks inflaming the situation there, allowing terrorist groups to undermine regional security and stability, according to Somali Information, Culture and Tourism Minister Daud Aweis Jama.
In a special interview with Arab News, Jama insisted that Israel’s unprecedented Dec. 26 move to recognize Somaliland as a sovereign state represents a major setback for Mogadishu’s fight against terrorist organizations like Al-Shabab and Daesh.
“The presence of Israel will be used by the terrorist groups to expand their operations in the region. (They will) have a pretext to spread their ideologies in the region,” he said.
“That is another factor that is also risking global security and regional stability, because we have been in the last stage of overcoming the challenges of the terrorist groups Al-Shabab and ISIS,” he added, using another term for Daesh.
Jama added: “We have been putting all our resources and all our time into making sure that we finalize the final stages of the fight against Al-Shabab. So, if something else interrupts us, that means that we are not going to focus fully on the operations against Al-Shabab. And that means we are giving more opportunities to Al-Shabab or other organizations.”
The consequences of this hit to Somalia’s ability to fight terror will not be restricted to the country’s borders, according to Jama, but will spread across the region and beyond.
“This might invite other, external terrorist groups to the region, because they will take advantage of this crisis and will make sure that they take over all the areas that have been defeated before,” the minister said.
“We believe this has come at a time that is going to affect our security as a Somali government, the security of the Horn of Africa, the security of the Gulf of Aden, the security of the Red Sea, the security of the Middle East and global stability. This is a very important location that holds the trade of the world.”
The minister underlined that Israel’s recognition and larger presence in the region are leading to more challenges, “putting more fuel on the ongoing challenges that exist in the region, especially in Somalia.” He added: “And at this time, it is not only limited to Somalia, but it’s going to be a challenge that is going to spread like a fire all over the region and all over the world.”
Jama told Arab News that Israel has other strategic motives for its recognition of Somaliland — including the forced resettlement of Palestinians from Gaza.
“According to reliable sources that our intelligence gathered, one of the conditions that Israel put forward (for recognizing Somaliland) was to have a place that they can settle the people from Gaza,” he said.
“We find that it is a violation also of the people of Palestine, because we believe that the people of Palestine have the right to self-determination. The two-state solution that has been the call of the international community has to be adhered to and implemented.”
Israel’s coalition government, the most right-wing and religiously conservative in its history, includes far-right politicians who advocate the annexation of both Gaza and the West Bank and encouraging Palestinians to leave their homeland.
Somalia’s UN Ambassador Abukar Dahir Osman said Security Council members Algeria, Guyana, Sierra Leone and Somalia “unequivocally reject any steps aimed at advancing this objective, including any attempt by Israel to relocate the Palestinian population from Gaza to the northwestern region of Somalia.”
Israel last month became the first country to recognize Somaliland as an independent nation. In the three-plus decades since its self-declaration of independence in 1991, no state had recognized the northwestern territory as being separate from Somalia.
Mogadishu immediately rejected the Israeli move, alongside countries all over the world.
Saudi Arabia affirmed its rejection of any attempts to impose parallel entities that conflict with the unity of Somalia. It also affirmed its support for the legitimate institutions of the Somali state and its keenness to preserve the stability of Somalia and its people.
A group of foreign ministers from Arab and Islamic countries, alongside the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, also firmly rejected Israel’s announcement. In a joint statement, the ministers warned that the move carries “serious repercussions for peace and security in the Horn of Africa and the Red Sea region” and undermines international peace and security.
The 22-member Arab League rejected “any measures arising from this illegitimate recognition aimed at facilitating forced displacement of the Palestinian people or exploiting northern Somali ports to establish military bases,” the organization’s UN Ambassador Maged Abdelfattah Abdelaziz told the UN Security Council.
In the most recent development in Israel-Somaliland relations, less than two weeks after Tel Aviv’s recognition, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar visited the region on Tuesday to publicly formalize diplomatic relations.
“It was a blatant violation of Somalia’s sovereignty that Israel recognized a region within the Somali Federal Republic as an independent state,” Jama underlined. “That was a total violation of international laws. It was a violation of the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Somalia.
“From the beginning, our path was to follow diplomatic efforts. And we kind of started with a successful UN Security Council meeting that supported Somalia’s territorial integrity and sovereignty. (This was) followed by other international actors like the Arab League, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, the African Union and regional bodies like the East African Community and IGAD.
“Also, the Peace and Security Council of the African Union has reiterated the importance of supporting Somali sovereignty and territorial integrity.”
