Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) made shocking and outrageous claims against special counsel Robert Mueller, including the accusation that he had protected radical Islamists "his whole career."

Here's what he said

In in 30 minute long interview with Judicial Watch published Thursday, Gohmert made extensive accusations against Mueller.

"This is consistent with Mueller," he said, "he has protected radical Islamists his whole career, with the FBI, and even as special counsel but, uhm, 911, we knew who, we found out who the perpetrators were, there were no question, that was radical Islam."

"And immediately after that, the anthrax scare occurred, and he was looking for something to take the attention away from the concern about radical Islam," he explained, adding that he believed Mueller botched the anthrax investigation in order to distract from the threat of Islam.

Gohmert said that Mueller damaged the FBI more than all the previous FBI directors put together, and that his "unconquerable ego" got in the way of positive policies at the bureau.

Panetta defends Mueller

Friday on CNN, former CIA director Leon Panetta responded to Gohmert's accusations, saying, "Wolf, as a former congressman, I would say with great respect to that particular congressman, he has no idea what the hell he's talking about."

"Bob Mueller was FBI director when I was the director of the CIA," he explained. "He committed himself to going after terrorists. To going after extremist Islam in order to protect this country. And whatever he's implying is absolutely not only wrong, but in many ways it reflects the kind of unfounded attacks that people are resorting to here in order to undermine what Bob Mueller is doing in this investigation."

Panetta called for Republicans and other members of Congress to denounce the comments from Gohmert.

Here are the comments from Gohmert and Panetta on CNN:

President Trump's personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani said Friday that he was seeking a review of the documents which led to the special counsel's investigation, and that he believed this would lead to Mueller's probe being closed.