President-elect Donald Trump announced Saturday that he chose Kash Patel to serve as his next FBI director, signaling that he plans to terminate current FBI Director Christopher Wray’s 10-year term early.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump praised Patel, a Trump loyalist, former senior adviser to the director of national intelligence, and a favorite of the MAGA base, as a “brilliant lawyer, investigator, and ‘America First’ fighter.”
“I am proud to announce that Kashyap ‘Kash’ Patel will serve as the next Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Kash is a brilliant lawyer, investigator, and ‘America First’ fighter who has spent his career exposing corruption, defending Justice, and protecting the American People. He played a pivotal role in uncovering the Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax, standing as an advocate for truth, accountability, and the Constitution,” Trump said.
Trump also highlighted Patel’s service during his first administration, including Patel’s time as chief of staff of the Department of Defense and senior director for counterterrorism at the National Security Council.
Patel first hit Trump’s radar while working as an aide to former House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes during the Trump-Russia collusion investigation.
Trump’s selection of Patel signals that the president-elect is pushing forward with his plans to dramatically shake up the FBI.
Patel will likely face a contentious confirmation battle in the Senate before he can take on the role of director. Patel has been outspoken about his desire to root out the so-called deep state from the Department of Justice and said that if he were FBI director, he would shut down the FBI headquarters building, where thousands of bureau employees work in Washington.
In an interview on the Shawn Ryan Show, he said, “I’d shut down the FBI Hoover building, on day one, and reopen it the next day as a museum of the deep state. And I’d take the 7,000 employees that work in that building and send ’em across America to chase down criminals. Go be cops. You’re cops, go be cops.”
Wray, for his part, has drawn ire from Trump and his Republican allies in Congress in recent years over accusations that the bureau has been, at times, weaponized against Republicans.
The FBI’s decision, under Wray’s leadership, to execute a search warrant for classified material at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence, as well as the bureau’s lack of progress on its investigation into pipe bombs found on Capitol Hill on Jan. 6, 2021, have both been subjects of Trump’s wrath.
Under Wray, the FBI has also faced accusations from Republicans of being biased against Catholics and improperly pressuring social media companies to practice censorship, two matters the FBI has disputed.
A House investigation and a federal censorship lawsuit uncovered, for example, that the FBI warned social media companies in 2020 that material from Hunter Biden’s laptop data might be used as part of a Russian “hack-and-leak” operation to swing the election that year. The FBI’s warning led social media companies to suppress a negative story that surfaced about then-candidate Joe Biden in the New York Post in the days ahead of the election. Twitter and Facebook’s CEOs later said they regretted censoring the story.
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Republicans’ perspective of Wray has not been entirely negative, however. Wray came to a hearing over the summer armed with an abundance of detail about the FBI’s investigation into the first assassination attempt on Trump, prompting thank yous from lawmakers who typically criticize him.
Trump also praised the FBI for its handling of the assassination attempt investigation, despite briefly switching gears and excoriating Wray in a tirade on Truth Social because Wray said a bullet or shrapnel hit Trump’s ear, rather than saying for certain that it was a bullet. The FBI later confirmed it was a bullet.
