President-elect Donald Trump’s latest pick to lead the FBI, Kash Patel, would enter office with no experience at the agency he’s been tapped to run and vowed to remake. But if the reaction from Republican senators Monday night was any indication, GOP lawmakers aren’t just open to confirming Patel; they’re eager to install him.
“I want the best for the president, and he deserves a nominee that will work for him and do the absolute best that our country needs,” Sen. Joni Ernst told reporters Monday night.
Trump announced Patel as his nominee on Saturday, indicating that he plans to push out the current FBI director, Christopher Wray, more than two years before Wray’s term is up. (Wray replaced James Comey in 2017, after Trump fired Comey — in part — over his handling of the Hillary Clinton email scandal. At the time, Trump dismissing the FBI director was a minor scandal, even among Republican senators.)
But Trump’s announcement that he plans to ditch Wray in favor of a fiercely loyal, controversial pick like Patel is hardly registering for Republicans this time around. In fact, some GOP senators seemed to express support for firing Wray.
“I can’t tell you any reforms that have been made since the Comey FBI,” Sen. John Kennedy said Monday. “I’m not saying that Mr. Wray didn’t fix it. I’m just saying that there hasn’t been a lot of transparency.”
Although senators aren’t exactly on the same page about what Patel stands for, they seem to agree on one thing: They are open to hearing him out.
“I know he has a lot of admirers and a lot of detractors, but I’ve never met him,” Sen. Roger Wicker said. “I’ve never had a conversation with him.”
Even Sen. Susan Collins, who has been outspoken about her opposition to other controversial nominees, appeared less hesitant about Patel.
“I don’t know his background,” Collins said of Patel. “He is the nominee that I will have to do a lot of work on.”
It was a similar story for other Republican lawmakers.
“I don’t know him personally or professionally,” Sen. Todd Young said. “If I don’t have enough information to make an informed decision at the end of that process, I will make that known.”
Sen. Rick Scott said Trump deserves someone loyal to him, given the Justice Department’s now-dismissed cases against the former president.
“Think about what this guy’s gone through,” Scott said. “He’s had his house raided. He’s been indicted. He probably wants somebody that knows he knows he’s going to be loyal to him.”
Patel, a former federal prosecutor and National Security Council staffer, was Trump’s pick for top jobs at the FBI and CIA in his first term. But cabinet-level officials were strongly against him, and Trump relented, eventually making Patel chief of staff to acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller in 2020. That gave Patel a perch of influence during the Jan. 6 riots — and it gave Patel an opportunity to blame Democrats for the Capitol attack.
Patel testified during a Colorado case on whether Trump was eligible to hold office that D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser was to blame for a lack of National Guard troops deployed at the Capitol, a claim that contradicted the findings of the Jan. 6 Committee.
Since leaving office, Patel has stayed close to Trump, wielding influence within the national security apparatus.
Last year, he shared with Steve Bannon that he intends to prosecute journalists: “We’re going to come after you. Whether it’s criminally or civilly, we’ll figure that out,” Patel told Bannon.
He’s also said he would like to “clean house” at the Justice Department, “shut down” the FBI headquarters in D.C. and “reopen it the next day as a museum of the deep state,” among other sweeping goals.
But GOP senators are seemingly on board with Patel’s plans.
Sen. Roger Marshall said he “110%” agrees with Patel’s calls to dismantle the FBI in its current form.
“I think he has an incredible résumé,” Marshall said. “He’ll have my full support … and absolutely believe that he’s the man for the job.”
Other senators said they didn’t believe what was being reported about Patel, even when told they were hearing a direct quote.
“Everybody says what they want to say about him seeking retribution … I just don’t see it,” Sen. Thom Tillis said. “I plan on meeting with him later this week, and I’m in a ‘presumptive positive’ position right now.”
When NOTUS asked Kennedy if he supported Patel’s goal of dissolving the FBI headquarters, he repeatedly referred to it as an “allegation.”
“I’ve read that as an allegation, but I don’t know if it’s true,” Kennedy said. “And again, that’s what confirmation hearings are about.”
Kennedy said his ideal candidate would be “a cross between Socrates and Dirty Harry.”
Sen. John Barrasso told reporters he hoped to meet with Patel in advance of the hearing to learn more about him. But Patel’s promise to reshape the agency seemed to appeal to him.
“I’m sure I’ll have a chance to meet with him before the hearing and talk about the issues, how he thinks that the justice system has been politicized, because it has,” Barrasso said.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski, another of the moderate senators who had immediate concerns about Matt Gaetz serving as attorney general, refused to say much about Patel on Monday. She blamed her relative silence on a lack of sleep from travel.
“I’ve said I’m not going to comment about any of these nominees,” Murkowski told reporters. “Because when one has not slept, it’s really not wise to speak.”
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Mark Alfred and Helen Huiskes are NOTUS reporters and Allbritton Journalism Institute fellows. Emily Kennard and John T. Seward, who are NOTUS reporters and Allbritton Journalism Institute fellows, and Haley Byrd Wilt, who is a reporter at NOTUS, also contributed to this report.