Kash Patel’s tenure as FBI director has been a national embarrassment in many ways, but among the most jarring developments this year is the sheer volume of bureau personnel who have been purged for political reasons, leaving the agency destabilized.
MS NOW’s Ken Dilanian noted that the ongoing purge “is without precedent in the modern history of the bureau. It raises questions about whether the Trump administration is trying to turn the nation’s most powerful law enforcement agency into an instrument of presidential whim — exactly the thing he baselessly accused his opponent of doing.”
That was in August. Things are worse now.
In fact, Dilanian and Carol Leonnig reported for MS NOW that Patel has carried out yet another purge of the bureau’s senior ranks. While the exact headcount isn’t clear, the former podcast personality has forced out field office leaders and other senior agents connected to the two criminal investigations of Donald Trump. From the report:
The special agent in charge in Atlanta has been removed, as has the acting assistant director in charge of the New York field office, two people familiar with the matter said. A former special agent in charge in New Orleans who had recently moved on to another job was also ousted.
As many as six agents in Miami were forced out over their connection to the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago, the president’s Florida resort where he stored classified documents, two people said. And other agents pushed out were involved in the ‘Arctic Frost’ investigation of Trump’s effort to overturn the 2020 election.
That kind of turnover, the report added, “is unheard of at the FBI.”
That’s clearly true, though it’s becoming a lot more common. We learned last month, for example, about a lawsuit filed by 12 FBI agents who were fired for having taken a knee during racial justice protests in 2020 as part of an effort to de-escalate a situation that threatened to intensify.
At about the same time, we learned of a lawsuit filed by a veteran FBI employee who was fired for displaying at his workspace an LGBTQ+ flag that had previously flown outside a field office.
What’s more, in August, Patel and his team ousted three experienced bureau leaders, including Brian Driscoll, a widely respected figure among rank-and-file agents who was removed after he helped prevent a mass firing of thousands of FBI officials who worked on Jan. 6 cases.
A month later, MS NOW reported on their federal lawsuit, which alleged that Patel “knowingly broke the law when he fired senior FBI executives at the behest of the White House and under pressure from Trump allies.”
The developments were tough to defend, but the pattern is tough to miss: Patel has spent much of his controversial tenure ousting agents who have done nothing wrong, as part of an ongoing, monthslong campaign.
Work on cases related to the criminal investigations into Trump? Fired. Work on Jan. 6 cases? Fired. Refuse to needlessly humiliate a former director? Fired.
It reached a point in November when the FBI Agents Association said Patel was not only imposing “chaos” on the bureau, he’d also “disregarded the law and launched a campaign of erratic and arbitrary retribution.”
The FBI Agents Association added at the time that the director’s antics had created conditions that make “the American public less safe.” Two months later, as the number of those caught up in Patel’s personnel purge has grown, it’s tough to feel any better about the state of federal law enforcement.
This post updates our related earlier coverage.
