Yes, court records show the FBI has and continues to explicitly do this. Leaks from folks like Snowden show the NSA/CIA have done this too.
> Specifically can your whatsapp/signal audio calls be recorded by FBI remotely in this manner?
The baseband firmware is at a level 'below' the operating system of the phone. It can directly access peripherals and intercept them, so it could be reading your microphone and passing it along to the higher level OS at the same time. WhatsApp/Signal thinks it's secure, and if you look at its app signature or anything else it looks exactly like the normal app you expect. However your data is still getting intercepted at the lower level and recorded for a state/government actor.