President-elect Donald Trump revealed on Saturday that he planned to fire FBI Director Christopher Wray and replace him with close buddy Kash Patel.
The appointment must be approved by the Senate.
Patel has been a long-time Trump devotee, having worked in several capacities throughout his first administration. He has loudly defended many of the January 6 rioters who were charged with their activities.
Patel has stated that on Day 1, he will target journalists, former senior FBI and Department of Justice officials, and convert the FBI into a “deep state” museum.
“This FBI will end America’s growing crime epidemic, dismantle migrant criminal gangs, and put an end to the evil scourge of human and drug trafficking across the border,” Trump said in a Truth Social post announcing his nomination.
Patel did not immediately respond to Trump’s announcement. Trump cannot make personnel changes at the FBI until he is sworn in.
Wray, the current agency head, was appointed in 2017 after President Trump sacked head James Comey, who had served less than four years of his 10-year tenure. Trump said Comey “wasn’t doing a good job.”
In a statement to HeadlinesForever, the FBI stated, “Every day, the men and women of the FBI work to safeguard Americans from an increasing array of dangers. “Director Wray’s focus remains on the men and women of the FBI, the people we work with and for.”
Former public defender with experience at the DOJ.
Patel, 44, was born in Long Island and graduated from Pace University Law School. He spent nine years as a public defender in Miami before moving to Washington, D.C., in 2013 to work for the Justice Department’s National Security Division.
Patel resigned the Justice Department in 2017, citing disgust with the agency’s handling of the 2012 terrorist attacks in Benghazi, Libya, which murdered US Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans.
Role in the Russia investigation
He went on to head the “Russia Gate” probe for House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, with Nunes promising to assist Patel in getting a post in the White House’s National Security Council after the investigation concluded.
As the self-described “lead investigator of the Russiagate hoax,” Patel wrote the so-called “Nunes memo,” which claimed that the FBI inappropriately eavesdropped on former Trump adviser Carter Page.
A major report by the Justice Department’s inspector general released in late 2019 found that the FBI was not influenced by political bias when it opened the investigation, but it did identify “serious performance failures” on the part of agents as they vetted information from sources and sought surveillance warrants against Page.
Patel joined the White House National Security Council in February 2019 as deputy assistant to the president and senior director for counterterrorism.
In February 2020, Patel accepted a “temporary duty assignment” as deputy to the newly appointed acting director of national intelligence. That November, after Trump lost the election, Patel was chosen Defense Department chief of staff, despite several detractors claiming he was unfit for the position.
After Trump left the White House, Patel worked in a variety of positions, including hosting shows for far-right media outlets.
Called for ‘housecleaning’ of the DOJ
Patel’s book, “Government Gangsters,” which Trump described as a “blueprint” for his upcoming administration, called for a “comprehensive housecleaning” of the Justice Department. He also advocated for the abolition of “government tyranny” within the FBI, sacking “the top ranks” and prosecuting “to the fullest extent of the law” anyone who “abused their authority for political purposes.”
“[T]he FBI has become so thoroughly compromised that it will remain a threat to the people unless drastic measures are taken,” Patel writes in his memoir. Democrats “should be very afraid,” Patel said.
He accused the Justice Department of “abuses of prosecutorial discretion” in declining to charge Hillary Clinton for allegedly compromising classified information through her use of a private email server, as well as declining to charge President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, for what Patel describes as influence peddling. At the same time, he contended that the department indicted Trump associate Steve Bannon for refusing to comply with a subpoena from a House subcommittee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the United States Capitol, as well as charging so many Trump supporters who were present that day.
On a podcast two months ago, Patel stated that everybody implicated in “Russiagate” should lose their security clearances.
Patel claims there is a “massive” list of such government personnel, ranging from the FBI and Justice Department to the CIA and the US military.
“They all still have clearances,” even those who left government for private sector work, thus “everybody” should lose their clearances, Patel said.
Patel said he personally “recommended” to Trump that the new government remove any security clearances still held by the 51 former intelligence personnel. This includes former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and former CIA Director John Brennan, who signed a letter in October 2020, just weeks before the 2020 presidential election, dismissing the public release of emails from Hunter Biden’s laptop as part of a “Russian information operation.”