The Senate has confirmed Kash Patel as director of the FBI, launching a new chapter for the nation’s top domestic investigative agency.
Lawmakers voted to confirm Patel 51-49, with Republican Sens. Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski joining with all Democrats in opposition.
A longtime Trump loyalist who has in the past expressed his desire to help root out the “deep state,” Patel has raised questions among critics about whether he’s prepared to insulate the department from undue influence from the White House. President Donald Trump has made clear he is prepared to go after his adversaries in his second administration, and Patel is poised to be a key figure in those efforts.
Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats took their ultimately futile fight against Patel to FBI headquarters on Thursday morning to denounce his nomination.
“Kash Patel — mark my words — will cause evil in this building behind us, and Republicans who vote for him will rue that day,” said Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) at the press conference.
Collins said in a statement that “Mr. Patel has made numerous politically charged statements in his book and elsewhere discrediting the work of the FBI, the very institution he has been nominated to lead,” which she said has “cast doubt on Mr. Patel’s ability to advance the FBI’s law enforcement mission in a way that is free from the appearance of political motivation.”
But other Republicans defended Patel vigorously.
“If you want to defend our constitutional rights, confirm Kash Patel,” Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso of Wyoming said in a floor speech Thursday morning. “If you want justice and accountability, confirm Kash Patel. If you want to keep our communities safe, confirm Kash Patel.”
Barrasso added, “Mr. Patel is a man of integrity and fidelity to the rule of law.”
Trump tapped Patel to replace Christopher Wray, who the president nominated for a 10-year term during his first administration but effectively ousted in naming Patel as the successor before that term was completed.
Republicans argued that Wray allowed the politicization of his agency in the opposite direction, blaming him for the sweep of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home as part of the investigation into his retention of classified documents.
A former Department of Defense and National Security Council staffer during Trump’s original stint in the White House, Patel has proven himself as an unwavering ally to the president. As a House aide, he worked to discredit the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Patel has indicated he intends to massively overhaul the agency, including by “coming after the people in the media who lied about American citizens, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections.” In his book, “Government Gangsters,” he also outlined members of the “Executive Branch Deep State” — what Democrats have dubbed an “enemies list.”
