1. United States
2. S.C.
3. Letter

Trump has announced he’s selected Kash Patel to lead the FBI. A reminder - directors of the FBI serve for 10 years and the mission of the bureau is to protect and defend the United States against terrorist and foreign intelligence threats and to uphold and enforce the criminal laws of the United States. But instead Patel is one of Trump’s most loyal enforcers and a conspiracy theorist — a 2020 election denier whose main focus is to purge the so-called “Deep State.” He recently publicly pledged to investigate and prosecute Trump’s enemies in the media and government. Patel is a hyper-MAGA, vengeance-minded Trump loyalist to the point that even some Trump advisers recognize as an extreme liability — even if those aides and confidants aren’t willing to do much to get in Patel’s way, mostly due to Trump’s protection of the man. Patel's lowlights include misleading Pentagon officials in 2020 about having secured approval for Seal Team 6 to enter Nigerian territory in order to conduct a hostage rescue, a deception that — according to defense officials involved in the operation — nearly resulted in an international debacle that could have endangered the lives of the extraction team. Patel was also reportedly the author of the controversial Nunes Memo, a 2018 document alleging falsely that the FBI had improperly obtained a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant against former Trump foreign policy adviser Carter Page. This year, Patel again ran interference for Putin and Trump by calling for the security clearances of government officials involved in the Russia investigation to have their security clearances permanently suspended. But it’s not just intelligence officials involved in the Russia investigation who Patel wants purged from the government — it’s any so-called “deep state” operative who has in the past, or may in the future, pose an obstacle to Trump’s agenda. In fact, Patel recently told right wing commentator and ex-con Steve Bannon that he has “the bench” prepared to carry out prosecutions against Trump’s enemies. And when Patel is not focused on this imaginary deep state, he's talked more broadly about trying to rid the government of any "conspirators" against Trump and of going "after the people in the media who lied about American citizens who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections," whether criminally or civilly. And Patel’s reputation in Trump’s intelligence community was so toxic that in 2021, the president-elect’s former CIA Director Gina Haspel threatened to outright quit when reports reached her that Trump was considering Patel for a role within the intelligence agency. Even Bill Barr opposed Patel's being appointed to a top position in the last administration. Kash Patel cannot be made FBI director for the next 10 years. His focus is clearly not on the bureau's mission. Please oppose this dangerous nomination.