Washington:

The Republican-controlled US Senate on Thursday confirmed Kash Patel, a staunch loyalist of President Donald Trump, to be director of the FBI, the country’s top law enforcement agency.

Patel, 44, whose nomination sparked fierce but ultimately futile opposition from Democrats, was approved by a 51-49 vote.

The vote was split along party lines with the exception of two Republican senators, Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who voted not to confirm Patel to head the 38,000-strong Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Patel drew fire from Democrats for his promotion of conspiracy theories, his defense of pro-Trump rioters who attacked the Capitol on January 6, 2021, and his vow to root out members of a supposed “deep state” plotting to oppose the Republican president.

The Senate has approved all of Trump’s cabinet picks so far, underscoring his iron grip on the Republican Party.

Among them is Tulsi Gabbard, confirmed as the nation’s spy chief despite past support for adversarial nations including Russia and Syria, and vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be health secretary.

Democratic Senator Dick Durbin, in a last-ditch bid to derail Patel’s nomination, held a press conference outside FBI headquarters in downtown Washington on Thursday and warned that he would be “a political and national security disaster” as FBI chief.

Speaking later on the Senate floor, Durbin said Patel is “dangerously, politically extreme.”

“He has repeatedly expressed his intention to use our nation’s most important law enforcement agency to retaliate against his political enemies,” he said.

Patel, who holds a law degree from Pace University and worked as a federal prosecutor, replaces Christopher Wray, who was named FBI director by Trump during his first term in office.

Relations between Wray and Trump became strained, however, and though he had three more years remaining in his 10-year tenure, Wray resigned after Trump won November’s presidential election.

– ‘Enemies list’ –

A son of Indian immigrants, the New York-born Patel served in several high-level posts during Trump’s first administration, including as senior director for counterterrorism on the National Security Council and as chief of staff to the acting defense secretary.

There were fiery exchanges at Patel’s confirmation hearing last month as Democrats brought up a list of 60 supposed “deep state” actors — all critics of Trump — he included in a 2022 book, whom he said should be investigated or “otherwise reviled.”

Patel has denied that he has an “enemies list” and told the Senate Judiciary Committee he was merely interested in bringing lawbreakers to book.

“All FBI employees will be protected against political retribution,” he said.

The FBI has been in turmoil since Trump took office and a number of agents have been fired or demoted including some involved in the prosecutions of Trump for seeking to overturn the 2020 election results and mishandling classified documents.

Nine FBI agents have sued the Justice Department, seeking to block efforts to collect information on agents who were involved in investigating Trump and the attack on the Capitol by his supporters.

In their complaint, the FBI agents said the effort to collect information on employees who participated in the investigations was part of a “purge” orchestrated by Trump as “politically motivated retribution.”

Trump, on his first day in the White House, pardoned more than 1,500 of his supporters who stormed Congress in a bid to block certification of Democrat Joe Biden’s election victory.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Kash Patel, former Chief of Staff to the Defence Secretary, speaks on the day Republican presidential candidate and former U.S. President Donald Trump holds a campaign rally, in Prescott Valley, Arizona, U.S., October 13, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

President-elect Donald Trump on Saturday (November 30, 2024) nominated close confidante Kash Patel for the powerful position of Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, making him the highest-ranking Indian American in his incoming administration.

“I am proud to announce that Kashyap ‘Kash’ Patel will serve as the next Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Kash is a brilliant lawyer, investigator, and ‘America First’ fighter who has spent his career exposing corruption, defending Justice, and protecting the American People,” Mr. Trump announced on Truth Social, a social media platform he owns.

Mr. Trump said Mr. Patel played a pivotal role in uncovering “the Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax,” standing as an advocate for truth, accountability, and the Constitution. Mr. Patel, 44, served as chief of staff to the Acting United States Secretary of Defense in the last few weeks of the Trump Administration in 2017.

“Mr. Kash did an incredible job during my First Term, where he served as Chief of Staff at the Department of Defence, Deputy Director of National Intelligence, and Senior Director for Counterterrorism at the National Security Council. Mr. Kash has also tried over 60 jury trials,” he said.

“This FBI will end the growing crime epidemic in America, dismantle the migrant criminal gangs, and stop the evil scourge of human and drug trafficking across the Border. Mr. Kash will work under our great Attorney General, Pam Bondi, to bring back Fidelity, Bravery, and Integrity to the FBI,” Mr. Trump said.

Who is Kash Patel?

New York-born Mr. Patel has his roots in Gujarat. However, his parents are from East Africa — mother from Tanzania and father from Uganda. They came to the U.S. from Canada in 1970. “We are Gujarati,” he had told PTI in an earlier interview.

The family moved to Queens in New York — often called as Little India — in the late 70s. It is here that Mr. Patel was born and grew. Mr. Patel’s parents are retired now and spend their time in both the U.S. and Gujarat. After his schooling in New York and college in Richmond, Virginia, and law school in New York, Patel went to Florida where he was a state public defender for four years and then federal public defender for another four years.

“So, lots of trials, lots of international investigations, lots of time in court, understanding the federal system and trying cases and learning how to run investigations,” he said.

From Florida he moved to Washington DC as a terrorism prosecutor at the Department of Justice. Here he was an international terrorism prosecutor for about three and a half years. During this period, he worked on cases all over the world, in America in East Africa as well as in Uganda and Kenya.

While still employed by the Department of Justice, he went as a civilian to join Special Operations Command at the Department of Defense. At the Pentagon, he sat as the Department of Justice’s lawyer with Special Forces people and worked interagency collaborative targeting operations around the world.

After a year in the position, Congressman Davin Nunes, Chairman of the House Permanent Select on Intelligence Committee, pulled him as senior counsel on counterterrorism. After April 2017, he spearheaded the Russia investigation of the House Intelligence Committee. It was here where he attracted media attention and played a key role in drafting a GOP memo, which, according to then-President Donald Trump, exposed the role of Democratic party and its leadership in the Russian investigation.

The New York Times described this as a “Kash Memo.” Patel said that this was a “great team effort.”

Mr. Patel is an Ice hockey fan and has been playing the sport since he was six. “I still play and I spend a lot of time volunteering coaching youth hockey in the area.”

Mr. Patel, who attended both the Houston and Ahmedabad rallies of Mr. Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi in September 2019 and February 2020, had earlier told PTI that the bilateral relationship had deteriorated under the Biden Administration.

“President Trump and Prime Minister Modi had an extraordinary relationship with respect. And they were working together to counteract the things like Chinese aggression, not just on the Indian border but on the global stage. They were also working together to counteract things in Pakistan when it came to counterterrorism matters and hostage situations,” MR. Patel said.

The two leaders knew that not only the strong relationship but also allowing the economies of scale to be built in India and America were mutually beneficial, Mr. Patel said.

Last fall he wrote the book ‘Government Gangster’ which argued that there is a severe lack of accountability. The book talks about the deep state and is highly critical of the U.S. bureaucracy, which he claims is highly infiltrated or dominated by lawbreakers.

Responding to a question, Mr. Patel then told PTI that the Biden Administration and the deep state are interwoven.

“The Biden administration is filled by these corrupt government gangsters who I list in the back of my book by name and title. It’s not a Democrat or Republican thing. It’s an apolitical thing that these individuals, whether they’re Trump appointees like Christopher W Ray or Biden appointees like Merrick Garland, they are led to this two-tier system of justice where they weaponise government and intelligence and law enforcement to target either conservatives or Trump supporters or call people on January 6th, domestic terrorists,” he said.