> Her lecture concluded, she proceeded to grill the agent. "I asked if he had official paperwork for me, if this was an official request, who his boss was," said Sell. "He backed down very quickly."
"Backed down" in this context seems to mean "went away politely without answering any questions". Leading with verification and diatribing afterwards leaves you with some documentation, or a strong implication that they're a troll. She just went in the wrong order, which is honestly understandable but leaves us with an unverifiable story.
>she lectured him on topics ranging from the First and Fourth Amendments to the Constitution, to George Washington's creation of a Post Office in the US. "My ancestor was a drummer boy under Washington," Sell explained. "Washington thought it was very important to have freedom of information and private correspondence without government surveillance."
Don't forget that lecturing the FBI comes after verification and documentation as well.
If that was an FBI agent he probably concluded she was not a desired partner.
