WASHINGTON (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump says he will nominate Kash Patel to serve as FBI director, turning to a fierce ally to upend America’s premier law enforcement agency and rid the government of perceived “conspirators.” It’s the latest bombshell Trump has thrown at the Washington establishment and a test for how far Senate Republicans will go in confirming his nominees.
The selection is in keeping with Trump’s view that the government’s law enforcement and intelligence agencies require a radical transformation and his stated desire for retribution against supposed adversaries. It shows how Trump, still fuming over years of federal investigations that shadowed his first administration and later led to his indictment, is moving to place atop the FBI and Justice Department close allies he believes will protect rather than scrutinize him.
Patel “played a pivotal role in uncovering the Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax, standing as an advocate for truth, accountability, and the Constitution,” Trump wrote Saturday night in a social media post.
The announcement means current FBI director Christopher Wray must either resign or be fired after Trump takes office on Jan. 20. Wray had previously been named by Trump and began the 10-year term — a length meant to insulate the agency from the political influence of changing administrations — in 2017, after Trump fired his predecessor, James Comey.
The decision sets up what’s likely to be an explosive confirmation battle in the Senate not long after Trump’s first pick to lead the Justice Department, Matt Gaetz, withdrew his nomination amid intense scrutiny over sex trafficking allegations. Patel is a lesser-known figure, but his nomination was still expected to cause shock waves. He’s embraced Trump’s rhetoric about a “deep state,” called for a “comprehensive housecleaning” of government workers who are disloyal to Trump and has referred to journalists as traitors, promising to try to prosecute some reporters.
In his final months in office, Trump unsuccessfully pushed the idea of installing Patel as the deputy director at either the FBI or CIA in an effort to strengthen the president’s control of the intelligence community. William Barr, Trump’s attorney general, wrote in his memoir that he told then-chief of staff Mark Meadows that an appointment to Patel as deputy FBI director would happen “over my dead body.”
A determination to upend the FBI
Patel has signaled through interviews and public statements a determination to upend the FBI and radically reshape its mission.
He’s called for dramatically reducing its footprint and limiting its authority, as well as going after government officials who disclose information to reporters.
In an interview earlier this year on the “Shawn Ryan Show,” Patel vowed to sever the FBI’s intelligence-gathering activities from the rest of its mission and said he would “shut down” the bureau’s headquarters building on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C., and “reopen it the next day as a museum of the ‘deep state.’”
“And I’d take the seven thousand employees that work in that building and send them across America to go chase down criminals,” he added.
In a separate interview with conservative strategist Steve Bannon, Patel said he and others “will go out and find the conspirators not just in government but in the media.”
”We’re going to come after the people in the media who lied about American citizens who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections,” Patel said, referring to the 2020 presidential election in which Biden, the Democratic challenger, defeated Trump. “We’re going to come after you, whether it’s criminally or civilly. We’ll figure that out. But yeah, we’re putting you all on notice.”
WASHINGTON (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump says he will nominate Kash Patel to serve as FBI director, turning to a fierce ally to upend America’s premier law enforcement agency and rid the government of perceived “conspirators.” It’s the latest bombshell Trump has thrown at the Washington establishment and a test for how far Senate Republicans will go in confirming his nominees.
