Q: When does "just asking questions" turn into an existential crisis at a law-enforcement agency? 

A: At 3 pm ET today.

That's the deadline for all FBI agents to complete an online survey as acting leadership attempts to investigate the scope of resources allocated to the January 6 riot probe. The incoming administration has made clear that they want to depoliticize the FBI, and the best way to accomplish that is to measure how politicized the bureau has been:

Thousands of FBI agents and employees are being asked by Justice Department leadership to fill out a 12-question survey detailing their roles in investigations stemming from the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

The questionnaire is contributing to a mounting sense of anxiety inside the bureau, as leaders and agents brace for a potential purge of those deemed disloyal to President Donald Trump and his new administration. It has prompted resistance from leaders of some of the bureau’s nationwide field offices, some of whom have urged subordinates not to fill out the questionnaire and let higher-ranking officials handle the fallout.

That sounds like very bad advice, and a very curious strategy under the circumstances. Why would law-enforcement professionals advise anyone to obstruct an investigation? These agents and other personnel work within an LEO structure and are supposed to be transparent and cooperative with lawful requests and orders. There is nothing unlawful about what is being asked, which is essentially a manpower-deployment review:

The questionnaire, which is due by 3 p.m. Monday, asks agents and FBI officials to detail their rank, whether they participated in Jan. 6 investigations and in what capacity. It includes drop-down menus that inquire whether they handled arrests, led operations, testified in trials or were assigned as case agents to the roughly 1,600 defendants who were charged, according to a person who read portions of the message to POLITICO.

The questionnaire also asks whether the officials participated in surveillance, discovery efforts, grand jury proceedings, witness interviews or subpoena review. It also asks if they followed up on leads sent from other field offices and performed other administrative tasks related to the cases.

Presumably, this information could be gleaned from official records, but that will take a long time to collate and likely require outside investigators to collect. Politico notes that the request comes in response to a demand from the Department of Justice's acting deputy AG Emil Bove to provide a full roster of all agents that worked on these cases. Bove gave the bureau a deadline of noon tomorrow, which means the best way to meet that deadline is through a mandatory questionnaire. 

Is Bove's request illegal? No. One might argue that he has political motives for demanding it, but there is nothing illegal about asking how personnel resources got assigned to an investigation. There may be multiple reasons for asking for that data, to which will return in a moment, but NBC reports that FBI agents are fearing a mass firing over the probe:

As fear of mass firings swirls through the FBI, acting Director Brian Driscoll, the head of the bureau's New York field office, and an agents group reassured staffers and pushed back against Trump administration efforts to force out FBI officials.

The unease comes after President Donald Trump publicly praised the firings of eight top FBI career executives on Friday after pardoning nearly all the Jan. 6 rioters hours after he took office for his second term.

In a message to FBI staff members Saturday night, Driscoll, the acting director, said again that the Trump administration is seeking the names of every FBI agent who worked on the Jan. 6 investigations — a number he has said is in the thousands. 

Is it possible that the incoming administration plans to fire "thousands" of agents? Yes, but that seems unlikely. If mass firings did occur, that would become a separate issue on its own, which could be addressed if/when it happens. Any value of firings would mostly get derived from booting those at the top who led the probe for dismissal, and perhaps a couple of second-tier lieutenants -- and those may already be gone. 

However, what Bove really wants is a comparative manpower assessment between the J6 investigations and, say, actual national-security investigations, counter-trafficking operations, and so on. Even at the time, there were indications that Christopher Wray and Merrick Garland took agents off of high-priority assignments to go after low-level trespassers and rioters. They may start looking at other issues too, such as the FACE Act enforcement efforts and how resources were allocated to conducting raids on pro-life activists versus pursuing terrorist attacks on pro-life centers, and so on.  They want that data sooner rather than later to justify the structural changes coming to the FBI and other federal law-enforcement agencies. 

That makes a lot more sense than just mindlessly dismissing thousands of agents. And I'd bet that's what has the people shrieking about "mass firings" and "retribution" a lot more concerned. To end politicization at the FBI and DoJ, one first has to take its measure -- and obstruction is not going to be a long-term option.