[one guy in new jersey]

With all due respect, it seems impossible that authorization for the FBI to “engage” with a former U.S. president and a fellow Article II law enforcement organization (the Secret Service) would ever qualify as “boilerplate”, however similar the language used might be to that used in previous FBI raids.

How hard would it have been to forego the need even for a “show” of force, much less
blithely pre-authorize its violent or potentially fatal use?

[Political Junkie Too]

I read it as more of a reminder of the rules of engagement than an authorization of use of force. I guess I just assumed that the FBI always has an implicit authority to use force.

But that could just be me.

-PJ