WASHINGTON (AP) – The Senate Judiciary Committee voted along the party’s line on Thursday to advance the nomination of Kash PatelDonald Trump’s choice to become FBI director. It pushes past democratic concerns that he will act as loyalty to the White House president and the target enemy.
The committee voted 12-10 to send a nomination to the Republican-controlled Senate for full consideration.
The final confirmation vote could be next week. Even candidates so far once considered uncertain outlook – including new ones Defense Secretary Pete Hegses, Tarshi GabbardDirector of National Intelligence, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Director of Health and Human Services. – We were able to supplement the ample support from Republicans eager to fall in line with Trump’s agenda.
Patel compared to other FBI directors and A huge catalog of inflammatory past statementscalling investigators who scrutinized Trump with “government gangs” and explaining that he accused the defendant of accusing the US Capitol on January 6, 2021 as at least a “political prisoner.”
At a confirmation hearing last month, Patel is trying to make, such as when Democrats offered to remove some of his comments from context, or shut down or turn the FBI headquarters in Washington into a museum. He said he misunderstood the broader point. The so-called “deep state.” And Patel thinks that the list of his government officials’ books, which he said he was part of a “deep nation” corresponds to a “list of enemies” and is called “a complete false false saying.” I denied.
Patel, Those who were chosen by Trump in November to replace Christopher Wray as FBI director In the recent forced departure of a group of senior executives, do you inherit an agency that was abolished by confusion? Very unusual Department of Justice demand for all agent names Those who participated in a related survey on January 6th.
A letter from Senator Dick Durbin this weeka top Democrat on the committee, citing a private source, said Patel was secretly involved in the process. A spokeswoman for Patel was called “second-hand gossip” aimed at pushing what she said as a “false story.”
Democrats on Thursday portrayed Patel as dangerous and inexperienced loyalty to abuse the powers of the FBI’s law enforcement while facing escalating threats, including China and international terrorism.
“This is someone who has doubts about judgment,” said Sen. Sheldon White House of Rhode Island. He added:
“If you put Kash Patel into this job, you’re engaging in a political disaster,” Durbin told a colleague.
Speaking to Republicans on the committee, Durbin said: I know you want to vote for all his nominations. No one wants a call from Elon Musk. But this is truly at the heart of the future of institutions that are important to the security of this country. ”
By contrast, Republicans praised Patel as a worthy of work, claiming it was necessary to correct the FBI, which they claimed to have been contaminated by bias in their criminal investigation into Trump.
“Americans are sick and tired of two layers of access, treatment layers and two layers of justice. And in Biden’s time, this was written heavily in the actions of the DOJ and the FBI,” Tennessee said. said GOP Senator Marsha Blackburn.
Florida GOP Sen. Ashley Moody said Patel “maybe he wasn’t serving in the FBI’s upper management, but he’s not asking this agency to set up a new course? The broad federal government’s government officials said. Do you want a candidate who has experience and is not currently traditional?”
Patel, a former Justice Department prosecutor, attracted Trump’s attention during his first term as a staff member of the Republican-led House Intelligence Committee. He helped write notes with pointed criticisms of the FBI investigation. On the relationship between Russia and Trump’s 2016 campaign.
Patel later joined the Trump administration as an anti-terrorist official on the National Security Council and as Chief of Staff of the Department of Defense.
