FBI Director Kash Patel has been crushed by the media, especially after four alleged terror attacks took place, but now he is set to flip the news cycle, touting some major reforms taking place at the FBI.
Miranda Devine recently piled on the hits against Patel, highlighting his “flamboyant” lifestyle, claiming it is hurting morale at the FBI. This is notable because she is a member of the conservative media and is even well-liked by this administration.
Now, Patel is hoping to flip the news cycle by touting crucial reforms made under his watch that the American people may not know about.
While the media did not care about Director Christopher Wray using the FBI jet to go on a family vacation, it is very upset when Kash Patel uses the jet for personal reasons.
To be clear, this is protocol, as the director has to be able to turn around at a moment’s notice in case of an emergency. The director is required to pay a competitive commercial rate for all personal flights. This is all above board.
But, with four recent terror-motivated attacks on the homeland soil, Patel’s lifestyle and cuts to the agency are getting all the headlines. In Devine’s report, she has a blistering quote from a former FBI agent who took a massive shot at Patel.
The agent, according to the New York Post, stated, “This person should have been made known to the FBI’s Counterterrorism Division, Threat Screening Center, and Criminal Justice Information Services [the largest division of the FBI] at a minimum. The [interagency] National Counterterrorism Center should have been engaged on some level, as well. Not sure if any of these components were actually aware and engaged on any level, even in the current elevated threat environment.”
Patel has been trying to put this fire out ever since, and he has been making numerous media appearances to tout the agency as well as finger other aspects of the justice system that could deter these attacks.
While on Fox News with Sean Hannity (via Breitbart), he stated, “That individual was convicted and sentenced [for] terrorism before, and no one bothered to denaturalize him and remove him from the country. But Sean, here’s what most Americans don’t know: In the Trump Justice Department in the first administration, that individual, we sought a sentence of 240 months.
"The judge in that case downward departed and gave him nearly half of that time. Had the judge given the sentence that the Trump administration wanted, that individual would still be in prison and not have conducted that terror attack.”
He then pointed a finger at Congress, adding that we needed "stronger legislation that allows us to sentence criminals and terrorists to prison and jettison them from this country permanently.”
The odd thing about all of this is that when Patel makes a massive bust of human traffickers or drug dealers, or even stops a terror attack, it is all ignored by the media. Which is why he is now doing this media blitz.
Case in point, he is now touting how the FBI may be leaner, but it is far more effective than under past administrations. Patel told Fox News, "Under President Trump’s leadership, this FBI has been rebuilt into a faster, more accountable force focused on protecting Americans and crushing violent crime.”
He continued, “We’ve surged agents out of Washington and into the field, expanded biometric screening overseas to stop threats before they reach our homeland, overhauled our intelligence and operations systems, and strengthened partnerships and technology to move at the speed of today’s threats. This is a results-driven FBI delivering real security for the American people."
If I had a problem with Patel, my readers know I would say it, but I really don’t to this point. I am not saying he has been perfect, anything but, but I think he is doing a respectable job. More importantly, most of my contacts who are former and current agents all give him a thumbs-up to this point. All of them believe the agency today is in a better place than it was when it was under James Comey or Christopher Wray. That is good enough for me.
