Senate Judiciary Committee ranking member Dick Durbin (D-IL) doubled down on his claim that Kash Patel personally orchestrated a “purge” of senior law enforcement officials within the bureau and implored his colleagues to “pause” consideration of Patel’s nomination during a speech on the Senate floor Tuesday.
“Multiple whistleblowers have disclosed to my staff highly credible information indicating that Mr. Kash Patel has been personally directing the ongoing purge of senior law enforcement officials at the FBI,” Durbin said Tuesday.
Durbin’s Senate floor speech came less than an hour after the New York Times reported that Durbin had sent a letter to DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz Tuesday, outlining “highly credible information from multiple sources” that suggested Patel had improperly directed a recent string of career official firings at the bureau as a nominee. Durbin also wrote in the letter to Horowitz that Patel may have perjured himself during his Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, if the allegations from his sources were true.
Durbin didn’t reveal his sources in the letter or in his Senate floor speech Tuesday.
Durbin’s office and the FBI declined to comment when reached by TPM Tuesday. The White House did not immediately return TPM’s requests for comment.
During his speech, Durbin explained the evidence he’d outlined in the Horowitz letter. He said whistleblowers revealed to him that Patel had been working in conjunction with White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, Acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove, as well as members of the FBI Director’s Advisory Team to fire senior law enforcement officials at the FBI, as an act of political retribution against Trump’s supposed enemies.
“It is unacceptable for a nominee with no legal or current role in government to personally direct the unjustified and potentially illegal firings of dedicated, nonpartisan professionals at the FBI,” Durbin said on the Senate floor.
In both his letter and during floor remarks Tuesday, Durbin described a January 29 meeting between Acting FBI Director Brian Driscoll and the Acting FBI Deputy Director Robert Kissane, during which it was mentioned that a group of FBI officials needed to either resign or be fired. According to Durbin, the FBI Director’s Advisory Team was in possession of a written list that specifically identified leaders within the bureau.
“The DAT was in possession of a written list that identified certain officials and was seen by multiple FBI leaders. Their understanding of the list was that ‘a lot of names were people in the crosshairs,’” Durbin wrote.
That meeting followed a meeting earlier in the day between DOJ and FBI leadership, according to Durbin. Contemporaneous notes, apparently seen by Durbin, from the morning meeting read: “KP wants movement at FBI, reciprocal actions for DOJ.”
“According to my sources, Mr. Patel is receiving information from within the FBI from a member of the DAT (Director’s Advisory Team). Mr. Patel then provides direction to Mr. Miller, who relays it to Acting Deputy Attorney General Bove,” Durbin wrote in his letter to Horowitz. “Each DAT member had represented to one or more officials at the Bureau at some point before January 30 that they had been in direct contact with Mr. Patel.”
“If this man is so fast and loose with the truth before our committee now, imagine what he will do if given the protection of office. We need to pause in this consideration and consider what we already know about Mr. Patel,” Durbin said from the floor Tuesday, urging his Republican colleagues to take this new information into consideration ahead of Patel’s confirmation vote.
If the accusations are true, then Patel may have “perjured” himself before the Senate Judiciary Committee during his confirmation hearing last month, Durbin said.
During last month’s hearing, Patel, answering a question from Sen. Corey Booker (D-NJ), said he “was not aware” of plans to fire or punish FBI personnel associated with any Trump investigations and that he would “honor the internal review process of the FBI.”
Patel similarly wrote in an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal a day before the hearing that, if confirmed, he would “remain focused on the FBI’s core mission and not involve the bureau in prosecutorial decisions.”
The Senate Judiciary Committee will vote this week on Patel’s nomination.
This all comes in the wake of a series of retaliatory firings within the FBI. The Trump administration has been specifically targeting officials within the bureau who were involved in January 6 investigations. At least nine FBI high-ranking officials have been ousted since Trump took office, per the New York Times.
