MS NOW told viewers FBI Director Kash Patel had landed in Russia for FSB meetings, even as he stood on stage at a Virginia law enforcement event.
On Wednesday, the network aired a segment claiming the FBI director had touched down in Russia. Anchor Peter Alexander pointed to two unnamed people who, he said, reported Patel had arrived for a scheduled meeting. Correspondent Ken Dilanian then walked through the supposed risks, including FSB surveillance and access to devices.
Patel was not in Russia. He was at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia, speaking at a law enforcement appreciation event hosted by Rep. John McGuire. The FBI’s Rapid Response account posted the network’s broadcast next to video of Patel on stage and dismantled the claim in public view.
The episode left a major cable outlet correcting itself on air, the FBI director demanding an apology, and another reminder of how thin sourcing can drive a national story off a cliff.
The bureau did not wait for a quiet cleanup. The New York Post reported that FBI accounts moved quickly to show where Patel actually was, using video from the Virginia event against the network’s own air.
FBI Rapid Response put the contrast in plain terms on X:
"Left: MS Now reports two sources familiar say Kash Patel just landed in Russia Right: Here’s where Kash Patel actually is... Liberty U, doing a law enforcement appreciation event MS Now’s “sources” are “familiar” with NOTHING!"
Ben Williamson, the FBI’s assistant director for public affairs, wrote that he watched the breaking-news clip air just as photos of Patel at the Lynchburg event reached his phone. According to the FBI, Patel had spent the morning at the McGuire-hosted appreciation event before the Liberty University appearance.
The visual record was simple. One screen showed a Russia landing claim. The other showed the FBI director in Virginia.
Roughly two hours and 10 minutes after the original segment, Dilanian returned to the air and conceded the report was wrong. He told viewers, “We regret this error.”
That was the network’s public walk-back. The original segment had treated the Russia arrival as live news and layered on operational warnings about Russian security services. The correction came only after the FBI had already posted hard evidence of Patel’s real location.
No identification of the two unnamed sources appeared in the available accounts. The network’s basis beyond the vague “familiar” label was not laid out in detail on air.
Patel answered directly. In a lengthy post on X, the FBI director said the outlet had reported he “landed in Russia” for meetings with the FSB and accused it of a pattern of false claims about the bureau.
"MS NOW just reported I had “landed in Russia” for meetings with the FSB. The same outlet constantly tells lies about this FBI and law enforcement’s historic achievements in safeguarding the American people. The results speak for themselves: • 53,969+ violent crime arrests (up 90%) • Nearly 20% decrease in the nationwide murder rate • 31,016+ violent criminals and gang members arrested (up 30%) • 10 of the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted fugitives captured (2.5× the prior four years) • 11,081+ child victims located and identified (up 21%) • 3,258+ kilos of fentanyl seized (up 8%), enough to kill 247+ million Americans This is no accident. It is due to the relentless work of this FBI and all of our state, local, and tribal partners. They owe an apology to this FBI, the men and women of law enforcement, and to the American people. -DKP🇺🇸"
He also stressed a simpler standard in shorter remarks tied to the same dispute: facts over clickbait.
The demand was not subtle. Patel framed the false Russia report as an insult to agents and partners who, in his telling, have driven sharp gains against violent crime, fugitives, child exploitation, and fentanyl trafficking.
The Daily Caller noted that Politico reported in July that Patel was tentatively set to visit Moscow and St. Petersburg on Oct. 14 and 15, with the FSB expected to serve as host. If such a trip had gone forward, he would have been the first FBI director to enter Russia since Robert Mueller in 2013.
That earlier reporting may help explain why a Russia angle sounded plausible to producers. It does not explain putting a landing claim on air from two unnamed sources while the director was speaking in Virginia on the same news cycle.
The status of any planned travel on the day of the broadcast, confirmed, delayed, or canceled, was not settled in the material surrounding the false report. What was settled was Patel’s location when MS NOW spoke as if he had already arrived overseas.
The clash did not arrive in a vacuum. Patel’s fiancée, country singer Alexis Wilkins, sued MSNOW and Dilanian over the summer. She described the claims at issue as defamatory, saying coverage alleged that the director ordered FBI agents to escort her drunken friends home after nights out in Nashville. Mediaite reported on that suit. The filing remains an allegation in active dispute, not a final court finding.
Against that backdrop, a high-profile location error landed with extra force. A network already in litigation with people close to the FBI director aired a Russia arrival story that collapsed under video from a Virginia campus event.
The sequence is straightforward. MS NOW opened with unnamed sources. Dilanian discussed FSB risk. The FBI posted side-by-side proof from Liberty University. Williamson flagged the timing of the photos. Dilanian came back more than two hours later and regretted the error. Patel posted performance figures and called for an apology to the bureau, law enforcement, and the public.
Cable news can move fast. Verification still has to keep up. Here, two unnamed people were treated as enough to place the FBI director in Russia while he was on a stage in Lynchburg for a law enforcement event. The bureau’s own cameras, and then the network’s own correction, closed the gap the sourcing never should have opened.
When a network can place the FBI director in Moscow while he is speaking in Virginia, viewers should treat the next “exclusive” with the skepticism the last one earned.
