High-ranking FBI alumni are sounding the alarm on a memo from Attorney General Merrick Garland highlighting a purportedly “disturbing spike in harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence” against schools and school officials, from parents. According to these former officials, the memo represents an unwelcome politicization of the bureau’s mission, and may portend further consequences down the line.

Garland’s memo, issued in October, instructed “the Federal Bureau of Investigation, working with each United States Attorney, to convene meetings with federal, state, local, Tribal, and territorial leaders in each federal judicial district,” in order “to facilitate the discussion of strategies for addressing threats.”

The …