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As he fills out his incoming administration, Donald Trump’s nominees have ranged from absolutely unqualified to ideological nightmares. But he might have just made his scariest hire yet.
On Saturday night, Trump announced he’s selected Kash Patel to lead the FBI. Patel is one of Trump’s most loyal enforcers and a conspiracy theorist — a 2020 election denier who wants to purge the so-called “Deep State.” He recently publicly pledged to investigate and prosecute Trump’s enemies in the media and government.
For years, Trump had personally promised that he would appoint Patel to a very senior role in a new administration, should he win. Patel is a hyper-MAGA, vengeance-minded Trump loyalist to the point that even some Trump advisers recognize as an extreme liability — even if those aides and confidants aren’t willing to do much to get in Patel’s way, mostly due to Trump’s protection of the man.
For instance, during the 2024 campaign, Patel announced to Trump’s enemies in the press and elsewhere: “We will go out and find the conspirators — not just in government, but in the media.”
Some Trump campaign officials, who quietly worried independent voters would chafe at some of Trump’s more authoritarian-sounding outbursts, saw Patel’s public comments as, in the words of one Trump adviser, “an undisciplined parody of what we were doing.”
Now, that supposed parody is just the law-enforcement reality of the country, if Trump gets his way.
Here’s what to know about Patel:
Patel is devoutly loyal to Trump.
Patel’s reputation as a Trump loyalist stems not just from his overt devotion to the president-elect but his explicit willingness to do anything — rule of law and consequences be damned — to please his commander in chief.
In August, one Trump adviser told The Atlantic that the president-elect understands that “Kash is the one you say to, ‘Hey, I’m not telling you to go break into the DNC. But …’ ”
While Patel has yet to orchestrate a break-in at the Democratic National Committee on Trump’s behalf, he’s been involved in enough sketchy antics to raise the hackles of some of the incoming president’s loyal sycophants.
Lowlights include allegedly misleading Pentagon officials about having secured approval for Seal Team 6 to enter Nigerian territory in order to conduct a hostage rescue, a deception that — according to defense officials involved in the operation — nearly resulted in an international debacle that could have endangered the lives of the extraction team. The hostage was rescued, but officials noted that the incident took place days before the 2020 election.
It’s that kind of unilateral gumption that makes Patel’s critics wary of just how far he will go to prove his value to Trump.
Patel was a fierce critic of the Justice Department’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Virtually from the beginning of Trump’s first term, Patel made a name for himself as a stalwart defender of the embattled president. Then an aide to former Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Patel was heavily involved in the committee’s counter-messaging efforts against Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into alleged ties between Trump and Russian influence operations.
Patel was reportedly the author of the controversial Nunes Memo, a 2018 document alleging that the FBI had improperly obtained a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant against former Trump foreign policy adviser Carter Page.
This year Patel called for the security clearances of government officials involved in the Russia investigation to have their security clearances permanently suspended.
“It’s not an act of vengeance. They have had the opportunity to recant, and all 51 of them have doubled down, and tripled down,” he said of a group of 51 intelligence officials who opposed the public release of Hunter Biden’s emails ahead of the 2020 election. “So pull them. I think he will.”
Patel is hell-bent on dismantling the so-called “deep state.”
It’s not just intelligence officials involved in the Russia investigation who Patel wants purged from the government — it’s any so-called “deep state” operative who has in the past, or may in the future, pose an obstacle to Trump’s agenda.
In his book Government Gangsters: The Deep State, the Truth, and the Battle for Our Democracy, Patel included a list of “Members of the Executive Branch Deep State” whom he had marked for retribution.
“I’d shut down the FBI Hoover building on Day 1 and reopen it the next day as a museum of the deep state,” he said in an interview earlier this year.
Patel recently told right wing commentator Steve Bannon that he has “the bench” prepared to carry out prosecutions against Trump’s enemies.
The prospective appointment exemplifies a larger throughline in Trump’s second round of government appointments, in which he is prioritizing the elevation of individuals who’ve promised to exact retribution on his rivals, as well as help him purge the federal government of his critics and other undesirables — replacing them in turn with hardline MAGA ideologues loyal to his agenda.
“The one thing we learned in the Trump administration the first go-around, is we got to put in all American patriots, top to bottom, and we got them for law enforcement. We got them for intel collection, we got them for offensive operations. We got them for [Department of Defense], CIA, everywhere,” Patel told Steve Bannon in December of last year.
Patel has promised to punish Trump’s enemies — including members of the press.
Patel has made clear that one of his priorities should he be granted any crumb of political power will be to act as an attack dog for Trump’s retribution agenda.
In December of last year, Patel told former Trump advisor Steve Bannon that he plans to “go out and find the conspirators — not just in government, but in the media,” he said. “Yes, we’re going to come after the people in the media who lied about American citizens, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections.”
“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, and Steve, this is why they hate us. This is why we’re tyrannical. This is why we’re dictators,” he added.
According to a source familiar with the matter and another person briefed on it, multiple members of Trump’s senior staff were furious that Patel was publicly saying the quiet part out loud — and being perceived as a spokesman for the campaign and Trump policy.
Former CIA Director Gina Haspel threatened to resign when Trump considered installing Patel at the agency after the 2020 election.
Patel’s reputation in Trump’s intelligence community was so toxic that in 2021, the president-elect’s former CIA Director Gina Haspel threatened to outright quit when reports reached her that Trump was considering Patel for a role within the intelligence agency.
According to a contemporary report from Axios, former Vice President Mike Pence intervened directly with Trump to prevent the schism.
Haspel was not the only top Trump official to oppose the elevation of Patel to a high position in federal law enforcement. When Trump last considered installing Patel in the FBI — as deputy director — former Attorney General Bill Barr reportedly confronted Trump’s chief of staff and exclaimed that such an appointment would happen “over my dead body.”
It’s been more than four years since Barr’s exit from the Trump administration — and the president-elect’s good graces. While Barr’s very much alive, his ability to throw his political weight around in Trumpworld is long gone. Soon, Patel could lead the FBI.
