[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 34 (Thursday, February 20, 2025)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1066-S1075]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                      Nomination of Kashyap Patel

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, in about 2 hours, the Senate will vote on 
whether to confirm Kash Patel to serve as Director of the Federal 
Bureau of Investigation for the next 10 years--10 years. If Senate 
Republicans confirm Mr. Patel, I believe they will come to regret this 
vote--probably sooner rather than later.
  I, for one, am convinced that Mr. Patel has neither the experience, 
the judgment, nor the temperament to lead this amazing criminal 
investigative Agency. It appears my Senate Republican colleagues are 
ignoring the many redflags in Mr. Patel's record, probably because they 
fear retribution from the President and Mr. Musk.
  Let me be clear: This is not a partisan issue. During my time in the 
Senate, I have voted for four FBI Director nominations before this one. 
Each one was clearly a Republican, and I voted for them nevertheless. 
Historically, the Federal Bureau of Investigation has been apolitical.
  I oppose Mr. Patel because he 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. Even before President Trump took office, Mr. Patel announced 
that he would force out FBI Director Chris Wray, whom he nominated in 
his first term before firing former FBI Director Jim Comey.
  The Director is the only political appointment at the FBI.
  Congress took steps to ensure that this Agency remains as apolitical 
as possible by providing for a single term of 10 years for Director and 
subjecting the appointment to the advice and consent of the Senate. 
Fifty years ago, we made this reform. We may see it all fall to ashes 
today.
  As we have seen for weeks now, the Trump administration's purge of 
the FBI is a political exercise that has spread to service career 
officials. There is the FBI Agents Association, and the two leaders of 
that association came to see me recently in my office to talk about the 
situation.
  Both of them are women. One is serving 17 years in the career job at 
the FBI and the other, 22. They were quick to add that their fathers 
had been FBI agents before that. It was clearly in their blood. They 
came to tell me about the situation at the FBI today because of this 
transition and because of the prospect of Kash Patel heading their 
Agency.
  They said morale has never been lower. They have gone through many 
Presidential transitions and have never seen anything like this. The 
declaration that is required now of FBI agents is to whether they will 
participate in the investigation of the January 6 rioters who assaulted 
this United States Capitol Building.
  Let's be honest about what is going on here. There is an effort to 
have Soviet-style historical revision. The Trump administration and the 
people they are pushing into leadership have to, basically, pass a 
loyalty of--in terms of the outcome of the previous Presidential 
election and what happened on January 6.
  They are somehow asked to ignore the obvious that we see on the 
videotape over and over again. The rioters that assaulted this Capitol 
are so dangerous that the Vice President of the United States sitting 
in your chair was physically removed by the Secret Service for fear 
that he was going to be hurt if he stayed in his position.
  Those of us who were on the floor of the Senate on January 6 were 
asked to evacuate this Chamber as quickly as possible. This was not 
simply a question of tourists getting out of line. These people who 
assaulted this U.S. Capitol Building were hell-bent on stopping the 
constitutional process of counting the electoral votes in the 2020 
election.
  And now the FBI and others are being asked to say the opposite, that 
this wasn't somehow a breach of law, a horrendous, terrible chapter in 
the history of this country, and that there was danger afoot.
  Because the President has given a sweeping pardon for the 1,600 that 
were prosecuted for trespass, seditious conspiracy, and use of firearms 
in the Capitol and the like, we are supposed to somehow discount this 
as a significant moment in American history. It was.
  For the FBI agents who participated in the investigation of that day, 
I say they were doing their job, they did it well, and now to remove 
them from the FBI because of that has obviously hurt the morale of the 
FBI Agency. When you stop and wonder what the future holds for them if 
another President comes in with another political agenda, will they be 
victims again?
  As we have seen for weeks now, the Trump administration's purge of 
the FBI is a political exercise that has spread to senior current 
officials. In the FBI's long, long history, this has never happened 
before. This purge has dramatically weakened the FBI's ability to 
combat national security threats and make America less safe.
  Senior leaders with collectively hundreds of years of experience have 
been forced out, creating a leadership vacuum. Thousands of line agents 
fear losing their jobs simply because they were assigned to work on 
cases involving the January 6 attack by President Trump.
  I have heard directly from FBI agents who now fear for their safety 
and the safety of their families. To understand why, let me tell you 
about a January 6 rioter named Edward Kelley. Mr. Kelley was convicted 
of assaulting law enforcement during the attack on the U.S. Capitol. We 
saw it, didn't we, in terms of the videotapes that showed our law 
enforcement agents trying to stand their ground of this Capitol 
Building being beaten back and assaulted by these mobs?
  Mr. Kelley was convicted of assault on law enforcement, and he was 
given a full and unconditional pardon by Donald Trump. But Mr. Kelley 
has also been convicted in his home State of Tennessee of conspiracy to 
murder the FBI agents who investigated his role in the January 6 
attack.
  Understand this: Now he is arguing that President Trump's blanket 
pardon--Mr. Kelley--should cover his attempt to kill FBI agents.
  When asked about the possible firings of career FBI officials at his 
confirmation hearing, Mr. Patel under oath--under oath--said ``I don't 
know what's going on right now,'' at the FBI.
  Mr. President, that is not true. Thanks to multiple brave 
whistleblowers, we now know that Mr. Patel likely committed perjury in 
making that statement. Even before being confirmed as an FBI Director, 
Mr. Patel is already directing the ongoing purge of honorable, career 
public servants, despite his status as a private citizen. He has no 
right to be part of this awful process.
  I urge my Republican colleagues to seriously consider these credible 
whistleblower allegations before you vote on Mr. Patel's nomination.
  Mr. Patel's claim about an FBI purge were not his only misleading 
statements under oath. At his hearing, Mr. Patel implausibly told me he 
could not recall Stew Peters, a man who has been identified as an anti-
Semitic Holocaust denier.
  I asked him repeatedly: What about Stew Peters?
  Don't know the man, don't recognize the name.
  This is simply not true, considering that Mr. Patel appeared on Mr. 
Peters' podcast eight times, Mr. President--eight times and he couldn't 
recall the man's name.
  Mr. Peters has since revealed that he and Mr. Patel directly 
communicate via their personal cell phones ``constantly''--
``constantly'' was the word he used. As far as Patel is concerned under 
oath: Never heard of the man.
  Why in the world would he do that? Why wouldn't Mr. Patel admit the 
obvious--eight podcasts and constant communication with this man. And 
an even larger question: What is he doing as the man who wants to 
direct the FBI

[[Page S1067]]

in concert with anti-Semitic Holocaust denier Stew Peters? What is 
going on here? Is he showing good judgment? Is this the kind of person 
you want to put in charge of 38,000 criminal investigators?
  Mr. Patel also claimed he ``didn't have anything to do with'' the 
recording of the so-called January 6 prison choir, which included at 
least six rioters who violently assaulted police officers. Mr. Patel 
thinks there is something interesting, maybe even amusing, about the 
fact that he created a choir of these individuals who had been 
prosecuted for what they did on January 6.
  Here is what Mr. Patel said to Steve Bannon after he denied knowing 
anything about this recording before the Judiciary Committee's 
recently. He said to Steve Bannon:

       We got this idea to record the January 6 prisoners who 
     recite the national anthem every night from the D.C. prison. 
     Then we took that to the studio. So we mastered and digitized 
     that.

  So as Steve Bannon showed, he is the mastermind behind this recording 
of these prisoners saying something about the national anthem every 
night. That particular tape that he created of the January 6 choir was 
taken to Trump rallies to be played as some kind of interesting display 
of what Patel insists are just political prisoners.
  One of Mr. Patel's choir boys, Julian Khater, K-H-A-T-E-R, was 
convicted of assaulting Capitol Police officers with pepper spray. One 
of those officers was Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick. Brian 
Sicknick suffered multiple strokes and died a day after the attack. Mr. 
Khater was one of the people who assaulted him.
  Mr. Patel has called these violent January 6 rioters political 
prisoners. That includes Guy Reffitt. Guy Reffitt was sentenced to 87 
months in prison for his role in the January 6 assault--87 months.
  Mr. Reffitt brought a gun to the Capitol on January 6 and recorded 
himself saying the following, which I will paraphrase because I don't 
want to use profanity on the floor of the Senate: We are all going to 
drag them out kicking and screaming. I just want to see Pelosi's head 
hit every effing stair on the way out and Mitch McConnell, too. Eff 
them all.
  Mr. Reffitt's 19-year-old son Jackson turned him into law enforcement 
after the attack, despite Reffitt's threats to shoot Jackson and his 
sister.
  Here is what Reffitt said to his own children:

       If you turn me in, you're a traitor, and you know what 
     happens to traitors? Traitors get shot.

  Mr. Reffitt received a full and unconditional pardon from President 
Trump. Guess where he was on January 30 this year? Back at the Capitol 
complex at Mr. Patel's confirmation hearing. Here is what Mr. Reffitt 
posted on social media from the hearing room:

       Present and in support of @Kash<Patel as the 
     leftist commies continue to spew lies, misinformation and 
     disinformation. My man Klean House Kash . . .

  Stew Peters: constant communication, holocaust denier; this gentleman 
he has become a hero to for his appearance before the committee; and we 
are all commies for questioning Kash Patel's politics and what it has 
led to. These are Mr. Patel's allies: Stew Peters; Julian Khater; and 
Guy Reffitt.
  On the other hand, consider who is warning us about Mr. Patel: former 
Trump officials who know him, like Attorney General Bill Barr, CIA 
Director Haspel, Defense Secretary Mark Esper, and National Security 
Adviser John Bolton. All of these were Republican appointees who worked 
with Patel, who know him well, and warn us not to do this, don't give 
this responsibility to this man--all Republican appointees.
  Mr. Patel has left a long trail of grievances, lashing out at anyone 
who is not completely aligned with him. He calls Democrats 
``vindictive, evil, and vicious'' and repeatedly attacks Republican 
Senators who don't toe the MAGA line.
  I read Mr. Patel's book ``Government Gangsters.'' It includes an 
enemies list at the end of the book, 60 names, ``members of the deep 
state'' in the word of Kash Patel, which includes distinguished public 
servants for both political parties.
  What do they all have in common, the 60 people on this hit list? From 
Attorney General Bill Barr and Merrick Garland to former FBI Directors 
Bob Mueller and Chris Wray, they all had the misfortune of crossing 
paths with the vindictive Kash Patel.
  Mr. Patel claims he respects law enforcement, but his words and 
actions demonstrate his disdain for the FBI. He said on day one he 
plans to ``shut down'' the FBI headquarters, and he has falsely claimed 
that the FBI ``was planning January 6 for a year'' beforehand.
  There is no truth to that statement, Mr. President. He is casting 
aspersions on the FBI that are undeserved. Mr. Patel's record 
demonstrates that he is dangerous, inexperienced, and dishonest. He 
should not and cannot serve as an effective FBI Director.
  Mr. Patel has been crystal clear that he plans on using the FBI's 
vast surveillance and investigative authority to ``come after'' the 
President's enemies.
  It is shocking that my Republican colleagues are willing to support 
him, despite the serious threat he poses to our national security. And 
I am sorry to say I believe that we will quickly come to regret this 
vote. When I think of giving this man a 10-year--10 years as the 
Director of the leading criminal investigative Agency in the world, I 
cannot imagine a worse choice.
  You want the person who has that job and that power to destroy people 
simply by investigation to show some temperament and some judgment. 
Kash Patel shows just the opposite. He is neither qualified nor 
prepared to assume this responsibility.
  I will be voting no and plead with my Republican colleagues: Please 
think twice before creating this situation and making it even worse.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
  Mr. PADILLA. Mr. President, I too rise today to oppose the nomination 
of Kash Patel to serve as Director of the Federal Bureau of 
Investigation.
  Now, let me begin by saying to Americans watching at home who may not 
be completely up to speed as to what is going on, the importance of 
this specific nomination or wondering, Who is Kash Patel?
  You might have been distracted these past few weeks by a rush of 
headlines coming out of the White House, maybe preoccupied with the 
cost of groceries rising by the week. You may have--if you got any 
news--been hearing about how President Trump, the richest President in 
history, has given Elon Musk, the richest man in the world, 
unprecedented access to millions of Americans' sensitive private 
information.
  Yes, Elon Musk has access to your personal, private information, from 
Social Security numbers, to home addresses, to your tax information. 
There has been a lot going on. All the while, President Trump has also 
tried to lay the groundwork to pass another massive tax cut for 
billionaires.
  So if you have been busy and struggling to keep up, I understand. So 
let me try to break it down for you.
  Only in the year 2025, when Donald Trump seems to have a headlock on 
the Republican Party, could a nominee this extreme and this unqualified 
be considered or confirmed to lead the FBI. No party of Reagan would 
ever support this big a threat to American freedom and our national 
security. No party of Lincoln could ever support this big a source of 
division among Americans. Yet here we are, pretending as if a man who 
promised to shut down the FBI headquarters on day one and turn it into 
a museum for the deep state is now fit to lead the FBI.
  You see time and again, Kash Patel has shown that his loyalty lies 
not with the rule of law but with Donald Trump. Why? Because he knows 
that Donald Trump is his cash cow. Trump is Kash Patel's ticket to 
selling more books. It is his calling card to try to book the next 
podcast interview and certainly key to landing his next job.
  Frankly, it is a pattern we have seen from all too many of the 
nominees that Donald Trump has picked for his second administration. 
These are people whose sole qualification is allegiance to Trump. This 
should disqualify any nominee, but it is particularly concerning for a 
nominee slated to lead the Nation's premier law enforcement Agency.
  When it comes to protecting the security of our Nation, there is no 
room to choose between patriotism and patronage. The American people 
need and

[[Page S1068]]

deserve a public servant who is 100 percent committed to the around-
the-clock safety of the American people.
  Unfortunately, through his actions over the course of the last 
several years and his conduct this past month before the Senate 
Judiciary Committee, Kash Patel has demonstrated a dangerous lack of 
judgment, lack of preparation, and lack of independence. He has shown 
that he is either unwilling or incapable of putting politics aside in 
order to ``protect the American people and uphold the Constitution'' 
should he be confirmed to lead the FBI.
  Throughout his career, he has shown a clear pattern of loyalty to 
Trump and of self-dealings at the expense of the American people. That 
includes undermining the FBI's work in order to protect Trump from 
investigation; profiting off of conspiracies about a ``Deep State'' and 
promoting an ``enemies list'' targeting public servants; selling 
picture books to spread conspiracy theories to children about the 2016 
election; endangering the lives of American servicemembers after 
inserting himself into a hostage rescue operation; refusing to commit 
in his confirmation hearing to enforcing existing gun laws that protect 
lives and have saved lives; holding millions of dollars in unvested 
stock in a foreign company tied to forced and child labor; and even 
producing a song and financially supporting the families of 
insurrectionists who violently beat Capitol Police officers on January 
6.
  Now it appears that this list includes potentially having lied under 
oath in his confirmation hearing about the role he played in firing 
career FBI employees based on their perceived loyalties. After we heard 
him swear in committee that he played no role in the firings, 
whistleblowers are coming forward to tell us otherwise. At the very 
least, this charge is so serious that it warrants further 
investigation.
  Colleagues, stretching the truth or potentially outright lying may 
score him points with President Trump, but as Director of the FBI, it 
will only put American lives at risk.
  Think about it. To all the Americans who might be watching from home, 
you wouldn't put an arsonist in charge of a fire department, would you? 
But with Kash Patel atop the FBI, that is exactly what we get. Career 
law enforcement will continue to be purged, the FBI will be weaponized 
for political gain, and our communities will be less safe.
  I want to make one final point to our Republican colleagues. 
Throughout this body's history, the Senate has had not just the 
opportunity but the responsibility to serve as a check on Executive 
overreach.
  Senators of both parties over history have exercised our 
constitutional duty to advise and consent to the President's 
nominations, and in the past, the Senate has rejected extreme 
nominations. To stay quiet when a nominee so obviously unfit comes 
before us--that sets a dangerous precedent. Think about the damage you 
will be doing not just to the institution of the FBI or to the Senate 
but to the trust that millions of Americans deserve to have in our law 
enforcement.
  But more important than that, today, consider this: Someday in the 
future, possibly the near future, when a loyalist FBI Director abuses 
the position and fails to protect the American people, it won't just be 
Kash Patel that will be held accountable, it won't just be President 
Trump we will try to hold accountable, it will be every Member of this 
body who supported his nomination that will also be held accountable.
  So I invite you, I encourage you to have the courage to say no to 
Trump because lives are on the line. Have the courage to stand up and 
protect your constituents, protect the American people. Stand up, do 
the right thing, and vote no on this nominee.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.
  Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I rise to strongly oppose the 
confirmation of Kash Patel to serve as the next Director of the FBI.
  The FBI Director leads our Nation's most important law enforcement 
Agency. It is made up of more than 38,000 nonpartisan public servants 
who work every day to take on violent crime, get fentanyl off of our 
streets, investigate cyber crimes, protect our national security, and 
so much more.
  The Bureau's motto is ``fidelity, bravery, integrity,'' and its 
Director must be someone who embodies those core values above all else. 
That is not Kash Patel.
  Let's start with fidelity. The FBI Director's loyalty is not to the 
President; it is to the truth, the Constitution, and the American 
people. But Mr. Patel has made it clear that his only loyalty is to the 
President.
  Mr. Patel has threatened to come after the President's critics. On 
one podcast in December of 2023--by the way, that is 2023, just a few 
years ago, not two decades ago, not when he is in high school--in 2023, 
he said, ``We're going to come after you, whether it's criminally or 
civilly. We'll figure that out. But yeah, we're putting you . . . on 
notice.''
  On another podcast last August, he said, ``When Trump wins in 2024, 
and is in power in 2025, we can prosecute them,'' referring to Justice 
Department officials. That was just last August.
  At his hearing before the Judiciary Committee, we gave Mr. Patel 
numerous opportunities to explain, to walk back his threats. He chose 
not to, nor did he try to explain his so-called ``deep state'' list of 
former government officials, including many Republicans who served 
under the President's first term. This list of his deep state 
government gangsters, as he called them, included former Defense 
Secretary Mark Esper, former CIA Director Gina Haspel, former National 
Security Advisor John Bolton, and former Attorney General Bill Barr--
Bill Barr, who received so many compliments from people in this body, 
from so many Republicans, including the chair of the Judiciary 
Committee.
  I remind our colleagues on the other side of the aisle that Bill Barr 
wrote that putting Patel in charge of the FBI, promoting him in any 
way, would only happen ``over [his] dead body.'' Gina Haspel threatened 
to resign to stop Patel from becoming her Deputy. John Bolton said that 
Patel ``demonstrated no policy aptitude at all.'' These are staunch, 
lifelong Republicans. They are experienced and respected people. I may 
not agree in any way with everything they have said or done, nor does 
everyone here, but we do agree that they are people of integrity. If 
these people can end up on Kash Patel's deep state list, we can only 
imagine what that would mean for anyone who might not be deemed 
sufficiently loyal to the President.
  We know what Mr. Patel wants to do with the people on his list 
because he already told us. In one interview, he said the people on the 
list ``need to go to prison.'' And his comments about his so-called 
enemies are not empty threats. His desire to punish all but the 
President's most zealous loyalists is far too real.
  At his hearing, Mr. Patel said that ``all FBI employees will be 
protected against political retribution.'' Yet, mere hours later, the 
administration forced out eight of the Bureau's most senior, 
nonpartisan public servants who oversaw national security, criminal, 
and cyber matters.
  One day later, an email was sent to FBI employees requesting a list 
of everyone who had worked on January 6 cases ``to determine whether 
any additional personnel actions are necessary.'' It wouldn't matter if 
it is just a brandnew person who gets assigned to a case or a senior 
person; didn't matter if these people were prosecuting people and 
investigating people that actually tried to do us harm in this Chamber, 
chased down former Senator Romney in the hall--that all happened--
destroyed offices of the Parliamentarian and others, cut police 
officers' faces and injured them.
  Then, when in any crime scene, you would have it investigated, this 
guy Kash Patel is questioning those FBI employees that were simply 
assigned to the cases to work on them.
  This is not the person we should be putting in charge of the FBI. And 
I know my colleagues know this. So many of them that were there at the 
time supported Christopher Wray. I voted for Christopher Wray. He was 
Donald Trump's choice to run the FBI, but I thought that he would be a 
man of integrity, and he was. I will also note that applications to the 
FBI have tripled since he has been in office, during that time period, 
because he has

[[Page S1069]]

improved morale. They have been doing their job, and people want to go 
work there.

  Mr. Patel's supposed enemies are not only government officials he 
disagrees with; he has threatened the press as well. No one agrees with 
every story the press writes. I certainly don't, and I am sure many of 
my colleagues have read stories about them that they don't like, but we 
believe in this country in the First Amendment. Mr. Patel, however, has 
referred to the media as--again, a recent quote--``the most powerful 
enemy the United States has ever seen.'' He said that not even on a 
podcast. He said that in a speech. Think about that. The media is ``the 
most powerful enemy the United States has ever seen,'' in the words of 
Kash Patel, nominated to be the Director of the FBI, to oversee tens of 
thousands of agents across the country--not China, not Russia, not 
Iran, not terrorists, but the press.
  And Mr. Patel has already publicly threatened journalists, saying:

       We're going to come after the people in the media. . . . 
     We're going to come after you, whether it's criminally or 
     civilly. We'll figure it out. But yeah, we're putting you all 
     on notice.

  This isn't someone with any business running the world's premier law 
enforcement Agency. This isn't someone whom we can trust to be faithful 
to our Constitution. This isn't fidelity to the rule of law and 
impartial law enforcement; it is a direct threat to it.
  Bravery. Fidelity, bravery, integrity--so let's talk about bravery. 
We all know that the Capitol Police showed bravery far and above the 
call of duty on January 6, 2021. We know that. We know that many of 
them--their gear was stuck on a bus, their riot gear. They weren't even 
able to access it, and so many of them were protecting us, people who 
worked in this Capitol when the people that were storming into this 
Capitol had better gear than the police had--and, of course, we made 
tons of changes since then, changes to the leadership of the Capitol 
Police with a new Chief, changes to the Sergeant at Arms, changes to 
our security profile. We have made those changes. Of course, we should 
have done that.
  But what we do know is they showed bravery. But rather than recognize 
the officers' bravery, Mr. Patel accused those who testified in the 
January 6 hearings of lying. When asked on a podcast whether Capitol 
Police officers told the truth in the House of Representatives January 
6 Committee hearings when they were under oath, Mr. Patel said:

       No . . . And lying under oath is a federal offense and they 
     should be investigated for it.

  Once again, our colleagues on the Judiciary Committee gave him the 
chance to walk back these comments during his hearings, and, once 
again, he chose not to. In fact, he claimed this ``wasn't accurate.''
  It was exactly what he said. We have the evidence. We have the facts. 
We have the proof right there, his words. I would think facts and truth 
and the proof should matter to someone who is asking to be head of the 
Federal Bureau of Investigation, but it doesn't. Literally, this is on 
YouTube. Anyone listening today could look it up.
  The men and women of the Capitol Police aren't criminals; they are 
heroes. And so are the men and women at the FBI who every day put their 
lives on the line to keep us safe, but Kash Patel disagrees. He wrote 
in his book, again recently, that ``the FBI has become so thoroughly 
compromised that it will remain a threat to the people unless drastic 
measures are taken.'' And he called the men and women of the FBI 
``utterly corrupt.''
  How do you think that makes people feel, people out in Minnesota who 
are going after bank robbers or gangs or drug rings, because Kash Patel 
didn't like one investigation of a bunch of mobsters that came into 
this Capitol and beat up police. And then he said he wanted the list of 
everyone that was involved in that. I don't think the FBI is a threat 
to the people like Mr. Patel. I don't think it is ``utterly corrupt.'' 
And I don't think my Republican colleagues believe that either. I think 
that they admire the people that work at the FBI.
  In fact, under Mr. Wray's leadership, as I noted, the morale of 
agents and personnel at the FBI has improved significantly, three times 
as many people, as I noted, applying as agents. These agents deserve a 
Director who will have their back and continue building the morale at 
the Bureau, not someone who denigrates their service and, as Kash Patel 
has done--again, we have got it, his voice saying it--called for their 
headquarters to be shut down and turned into a museum. That was one of 
his later comments.
  The men and women of the FBI show us every day what it means to 
embody bravery, and now we need to show them that we, too, can be brave 
and tell the President on this one: No, this is not the right person. 
We know he is your friend. We know you have hung out with him a lot, 
but this is not the person for this job.
  I ask my colleagues to vote no on just one of these nominees. I voted 
yes on some of them. I looked at their credentials. I made a decision. 
Maybe wouldn't have been the first person I picked, but I voted yes on 
some of them. I ask them to vote no on Kash Patel.
  Integrity, FBI, integrity, ``I''--the FBI runs on facts. It runs on 
truth. Without truth, the whole system breaks down. And in his hearing, 
Mr. Patel made clear why Americans should be so concerned about putting 
someone in charge of the FBI who clearly does not have the integrity 
the job demands. Mr. Patel did not even have the integrity to stand by 
his own words that we had on YouTube. Instead of disavowing or 
providing explanations for his past statements, he repeatedly misled 
the committee, dodged questions, and claimed ignorance, claimed he 
didn't remember things he had said just a few months before. Why would 
you want someone in the FBI that doesn't remember things they said only 
a few months before?

  This is irresponsible at best and deceitful at worst.
  The Director of our Nation's most powerful law enforcement Agency 
must be forthright and trustworthy. He must follow the facts and 
carefully analyze evidence before drawing conclusions. Unfortunately, 
Mr. Patel has proven that his allegiance is to the President, not to 
the truth.
  Independence of the FBI from the White House is critical. We recently 
saw courageous prosecutors stand up for an independent justice system. 
They resigned instead of carrying out politicized orders from the 
administration. These were not liberal lawyers. These were not members 
of the resistance. The Acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District 
of New York, Danielle Sassoon, was a Federalist Society member and a 
clerk to Justice Scalia. She is a rising star. She is so respected, she 
has taken on major, major cases and won against criminals time and time 
again, and she gave up the position of the acting head of one of the 
most incredible prosecutor's offices in the country, the Southern 
District of New York.
  And the lead prosecutor of the case, Hagan Scotten, was a decorated 
Iraq war veteran. He clerked for Justice Roberts and Justice Cavanaugh, 
when Justice Cavanaugh was on the Court of Appeals. In his resignation 
letter, he wrote:

       I expect you will eventually find someone who is enough of 
     a fool, or enough of a coward, to file your motion. But it 
     was never going to be me.

  I think we should think about those words when we take our vote.

       I expect you will eventually find someone who is enough of 
     a fool, or enough of a coward, to file your motion. But it 
     was never going to be me.

  My Republican colleagues need to show some of the same courage as 
these public servants. They need to stop acquiescing and stand up to 
this assault on our justice system, and a good place to start is by 
voting against Patel.
  The fact is, Federal law enforcement and the American people deserve 
a Director who embodies the Bureau's motto: ``Fidelity, Bravery, and 
Integrity.''
  I will be voting no on his confirmation, and I ask our Republican 
colleagues to join me in standing up for justice, in standing for the 
rule of law.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Hawaii.
  Ms. HIRONO. Mr. President, as the leading law enforcement Agency in 
our country, the FBI does critical work

[[Page S1070]]

every single day to keep our Nation, to keep us, safe--from 
counterterrorism and countertrafficking to fighting cyberattacks and so 
much more. At a time of global instability, FBI agents are working day 
in and day out to protect us from threats, both foreign and domestic.
  But today, the FBI and the Department of Justice face a crisis caused 
not by any outside threat but rather by the men and women tasked with 
leading these Agencies. Instead of focusing on potential attacks, 
hacks, or violent criminal enterprises, we have a DOJ and FBI that have 
been turned inward on themselves.
  In just the last month, dozens of senior career FBI and DOJ employees 
have been purged--purged--en masse by President Trump and his 
administration. Hundreds of thousands of the prosecutors and FBI 
special agents and analysts may be next--in fact, I shouldn't use the 
word ``may,'' will be next. Purging hard-working and dedicated civil 
servants does nothing to make us safe; in fact, it does just the 
opposite.
  Attorney General Bondi recently announced the creation of a 
``weaponization working group.'' It only continues this trend. Through 
this working group, she is doing what she told us she would not do in 
her confirmation hearings. She is ``investigating the investigators'' 
with this working group, and I expect will be prosecuting the 
prosecutors.
  I fear what a DOJ and FBI focused inward on themselves means for the 
safety and security of our Nation, which brings me to Kash Patel, 
President Trump's nominee to lead the FBI. For many reasons, Mr. Patel 
is not the man to answer the many challenges of the moment. Mr. Patel 
spent his nomination hearings avoiding every hard question, not even 
the hard questions. I asked him, for example, if he would investigate 
people--60 people--on his ``deep state'' list. He would not say no. And 
it was pretty clear, this list--and I suspect it is growing--but the 
60-person list are all the people who are not sufficiently loyal to 
President Trump. So it has many, many Republicans on the list, and what 
the heck is he planning do with that list? Believe me, it is not 
because they are going to be commended for the work that they did.
  I asked him in his hearings whether he profited from selling 
supplements to detox the COVID-19 vaccine, supplements he promoted on 
his social media channels. He did not answer.
  I asked him if Donald Trump lost the 2020 election. He would not 
answer.
  He claimed not to know an anti-Semitic extremist named Stew Peters, 
despite the fact that he appeared on this person's program eight times.
  He tried to claim no involvement with the January 6 Choir made up of 
inmates--made up of inmates--serving in prison for their part in the 
violent insurrection on January 6 at the Capitol.
  And, of course, we all know all of these inmates have been pardoned 
en masse by the President. He claimed no involvement with this choir 
despite promoting them and hawking their merchandise for years.
  He was unwilling to provide any details about his grand jury 
testimony related to the January 6 insurrection--testimony he had to be 
compelled to give after taking the Fifth Amendment. Of course, Mr. 
Patel has the same rights as any American to plead the Fifth. But we 
have an equal right to ask him, as the nominee for the FBI Director, no 
less, why he did so and to learn what his ultimate testimony was.
  The one thing Mr. Patel did testify to was in response to a question 
from Senator Booker about whether he was ``aware of any plans or 
discussions to punish . . . FBI agents or personnel associated with 
Trump investigations,'' and his response was that he was ``not aware of 
that.''
  We have since learned of credible evidence that Mr. Patel perjured 
himself with that statement.
  Mr. Patel is totally unfit to lead the FBI. It is clear he won't 
discern fact from fiction and that he will be loyal to Donald Trump and 
Donald Trump only, which means total disregard for the Constitution and 
the rule of law.
  Ours is a nation of laws. Mr. Patel's nomination is one more 
indication that Donald Trump fancies himself above the law, even 
referring to himself as ``King'' in a recent tweet, and will weaponize 
the law however he wants to, and that is to advance his political 
agenda.
  Mr. Patel's is a dangerous nomination that will make our country less 
safe, less secure, and will erode America's trust in the FBI.
  Mr. President, our administrative Agencies--and, certainly, the 
Department of Justice and the FBI--do not exist to be used as tools for 
retribution by Donald Trump, Pam Bondi, or Kash Patel, but that is 
exactly what is happening with our Agencies and the firing and the 
purging of thousands of people who are doing the job of the people.
  What can we be thinking in supporting Mr. Patel to lead an Agency 
that has the tools to spy and go after all the people that he doesn't 
like?
  I urge my colleagues to vote no on this nomination.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
  Mr. SCHIFF. Mr. President, today, the Senate is on track to confirm 
Kash Patel as Director of the FBI. Think about that statement for a 
moment. Kash Patel--conspiracy theorist, January 6 denier, MAGA 
sycophant, and political provocateur--will be FBI Director.
  The absurdity of it, the destructive consequences of it--and it is 
worth asking today: How did we get here to such an extreme point, to 
this moment when someone so patently unqualified--really, disqualified 
from any position of responsibility--is poised to become Director of 
the Nation's preeminent law enforcement Agency?
  Earlier today, I stood with my colleagues out in front of the FBI 
headquarters, a building that Kash Patel promised to dismantle on his 
first day as FBI Director and turn into a museum to the deep state, the 
home of a Department that we all know he will convert into a political 
weapon for the President--the President who is a serial law breaker and 
will use Patel as a tool for retribution against his enemies.
  But in a democracy, law enforcement does not serve the President, let 
alone someone who fashions himself as a King. Law enforcement serves 
the people. It is nonpartisan. It is not a vehicle of political payback 
for a political party. And yet we are watching the FBI and DOJ hollowed 
out, dismantled, and turned into an investigative and prosecutorial 
extension of Donald Trump's White House. We are watching it live in 
realtime. It is already happening in that building we visited this 
morning.
  In just the last month, Donald Trump's Department of Justice has 
engaged in a brazen sweeping purge, a rolling Saturday night massacre, 
an unmistakable campaign to intimidate, punish, and drive out thousands 
of hard-working nonpartisan FBI and career DOJ employees. This is 
happening as we speak.
  Acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove fired roughly two dozen 
prosecutors involved in January 6 criminal cases--not for cause, not 
for corruption, not for misconduct. They were fired for failing what 
is, in effect, a loyalty test--a loyalty test.
  A MAGA mob attacks the Capitol on January 6 to stop the peaceful 
transfer of power. They beat police officers, gouge them, bear-spray 
them, all in the service of an even bigger crime--stopping the peaceful 
transfer of power after Donald Trump lost his reelection. And they get 
pardoned by Donald Trump. The lawbreakers get pardoned, and the brave 
FBI agents who tracked down these violent miscreants--these agents get 
punished, they get fired, they get purged.
  The one-man wrecking ball that is Donald Trump is turning the world 
upside down. The criminals are being pardoned and the cops are being 
punished.
  Kash Patel sat before the Senate Judiciary Committee and, under oath, 
insisted he knew of no plans to punish FBI employees involved in 
investigations related to Donald Trump. He positively levitated at the 
suggestion that such a thing could even be true. Then, within days, top 
FBI agents were fired. Thousands of FBI employees--career 
professionals--were sent a detailed questionnaire demanding they 
disclose any involvement in investigations related to the January 6 
insurrection. A warning accompanied this: ``Additional personnel 
actions'' could follow.
  Yet Mr. Patel testified that ``there will be no politicization at the 
FBI.

[[Page S1071]]

There will be no retributive actions taken by any FBI should I be 
confirmed as FBI Director.''
  He sat in that committee room and told the Senate all FBI employees 
will be protected against political retribution. That was a Thursday, 3 
weeks ago. The very next day, the purges began. Before the ink had 
dried on the transcript of that hearing, the retribution campaign had 
begun.
  In his written response to questions, Patel denies knowing about 
these actions in advance; denies knowing whether he discussed these 
dismissals with the White House, the DOJ, or the FBI. He wrote:

       I do not recall having conversations with the transition 
     team about pursuing any particular investigations or targets.

  I asked him in writing about these actions and his answer was he 
doesn't remember. But, in fact, whistleblowers have come forward to 
testify or to state that, not only did Patel know about the upcoming 
purges, he was directing those dismissals.
  How could he not recall that? It wasn't years ago or even months. It 
was days before--days before his written answers to those questions--
those written answers where he said he couldn't recall he was directing 
these purges covertly as a private citizen. But he doesn't recall--
purges of quality career professionals who dedicated their lives to the 
rule of law, who have been fired, laid-off, or forced out because they 
dared investigate a violent insurrection on our Capitol or the 
President's retention of classified documents that contained our 
nuclear and other national security secrets.
  There was a time in our country when the FBI was weaponized, when it 
served as a sword for the President; and the DOJ served as his shield 
when Hoover authorized covert harassment campaigns against the 
perceived enemies of the President. We thought those days were over.
  And they were over, until now.
  We must not put in place a Roy Cohn for the President, someone who 
will bend and break the law to serve the President's personal and 
political aims, for therein lies the path to corruption, to unlimited 
power, and to malfeasance of the highest order.
  We put up guardrails to prevent one man and his cadre of company men 
from turning the Bureau and Department into a partisan and lawless 
battering ram. We must not take them down because we know the road that 
lies ahead, and we know that Donald Trump cannot destroy the 
nonpartisan character of the FBI and the Department of Justice without 
his enablers.
  And Kash Patel? Kash Patel is Donald Trump's handpicked enabler and 
henchman, the guy who would say yes when everyone else would say no to 
any immoral and unlawful request made by Donald Trump--the guy who 
publicized his ``deep state'' list, almost half of whom are 
Republicans; the guy who worked for--and retains millions of dollars in 
stock in--a company supported by the Chinese Communist Party.
  In any normal world, that would automatically disqualify someone from 
leading the Nation's premier law enforcement and counterintelligence 
Agency. This is not someone we would want running the FBI.
  It would be unthinkable to confirm a nominee who has written an 
entire book in service of ``dramatically limit[ing] and refocus[ing] 
the scope of the FBI's authority''--a nominee who has publicly said: 
``It would be fun to go on a manhunt of government gangsters'' 
alongside those who ``represent Donald Trump's army to take this 
country back.''
  I am of the opinion that the people the FBI should be going on 
manhunts for are actual criminals, not the President's enemies of the 
day. The FBI shouldn't serve as Donald Trump's army.
  Alas, we will not soon forget the last time Donald Trump's army 
presented itself to us, when they beat down the doors of this Capitol, 
when they attacked law enforcement and sought to overturn an election.
  Mr. Patel is quite familiar with that mob. He celebrated them in 
song. Mr. Patel tried to deny his association with the January 6 choir. 
He said he has nothing to do with their recording. But earlier, on 
Steve Bannon's podcast, he was all too proud to brag about it:

       So what we thought would be cool is if we captured that 
     audio and then, of course, had the greatest President, 
     President Donald J. Trump, recite the pledge of allegiance, 
     then we went to a studio and recorded it, mastered it, 
     digitized it, put it out as a song now released exclusively 
     on the War Room.

  When I asked him about this, under oath, his response was--and you 
may never believe this--when he said ``we did this and we did that,'' 
``we'' didn't include him. I don't know what is worse, taking credit 
for something he didn't do or doing something then lying about it. But 
what I do know is this is not the character of someone who should be 
Director of the FBI.
  At the hearing, I also asked him to turn and face the Capitol Police 
officers in the room--these officers from the same department that 
suffered such grievous injuries on January 6. He couldn't do so. He 
couldn't look them in the eye. I don't blame him for being too ashamed. 
He should be ashamed, celebrating their victimization in a song. He 
should be ashamed, and anyone voting to confirm him should be ashamed.
  Yet here we are, on the fast track to rubberstamp his confirmation, 
asked to turn a blind eye as he takes control of the most powerful law 
enforcement Agency in the country. That is what my Republican 
colleagues seem poised to do.
  I will ask again: How on Earth did we get here? And where are we 
going by confirming a nominee who is so plainly unqualified, who is 
tied up in shady business dealings with the CCP and the Kremlin, who 
made songs with violent cop beaters, who made memes of himself sawing 
the heads off of Members of Congress.
  How on Earth did we get here? Because we all know where this road 
ends: a weaponized FBI; investigations into anyone who stands up to 
Donald Trump--elected officials, journalists, Democrats and 
Republicans--anyone.
  I know some of my colleagues seek solace in the belief that if they 
just toe the line for long enough, they will be spared, but we all know 
what happens when someone falls out of favor with Donald Trump--when 
you are inevitably asked to vote for something or do something so 
egregious that you cannot possibly continue to say yes. When you reach 
that moment when you are forced to cross the President or abandon your 
final line in the sand, it will be these moments you will remember: the 
concessions to a wannabe authoritarian that you were willing to 
entertain; the lines that you allowed him to cross so you would be 
spared his wrath. But you will not be spared. No one is--not the 
veteran, nonpartisan employees at the FBI, not the maverick, moderate 
Members of this body, nor even the most extreme supporters--left out in 
the cold the moment they are no longer valuable to this President.
  When, not if, you fall out of favor with Donald Trump, Patel and 
others may be unleashed on you as well. My colleagues should remember 
there is more room under Donald Trump's bus than on it. Enabling his 
administration is a one-way street, and by continuing to go down it, 
you drive yourselves and the foundations of our democracy to the very 
precipice.
  My colleagues, we have a duty today--a duty to the Constitution and a 
duty to the American people. We have a duty to the 38,000 men and women 
of the FBI who put themselves and their lives on the line every single 
day, those who work in the building where we stood this morning in the 
freezing cold and in communities and cities across the country, keeping 
us safe and secure. We must take that duty seriously because if we 
confirm Kash Patel knowing what we are getting, knowing where we are 
going, we will only have ourselves to blame.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Rhode Island.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I am here to join my distinguished 
colleague from California in opposition to the nomination of Kash Patel 
and to make crystal clear to this body what he is going to do in that 
job. He has shown who he is. So when these things go wrong, I want to 
be absolutely clear that our Republican friends were warned. They will 
own the consequences of Kash Patel's misbehavior.
  Let's start with the fact that, unlike any FBI Director before, this 
guy is a vitriolic partisan. Those are the stripes he shows when he is 
left to his own devices, and those are the characteristics

[[Page S1072]]

he will revert back to when he is running the FBI.
  Here are just a few simple examples. This is from his book called 
``Government Gangsters,'' and this is a page of his enemies' list. 
Well, Attorney General Bondi said no one should come to a law 
enforcement job with an enemies' list, so then they had to pretend that 
this was not an enemies' list. Well, of course, it is an enemies' list. 
Here is what Kash Patel himself says about it: ``Names named. Roadmap 
unveiled. The man hunt starts tomorrow.'' If you are going to set up a 
manhunt against people, are they not your enemies by any logical 
definition of the term?
  He goes on to a video that shows himself chain-sawing off the heads 
of the people on his enemies' list, including the handsome junior 
Senator from California and the daughter of former Vice President 
Cheney. It is a pretty gross image to be cutting the heads off of 
people with a saw. He didn't put it up, but he retweeted it. He loved 
it so much that he put it up on his own media.
  Things like that are not appropriate for an FBI Director. They are 
bizarre for just a normally weird person, but for an abnormally weird 
person to be the Director of the FBI, things are going to go bad. Be 
warned.
  He is also a completely sycophantic suck-up when it comes to Donald 
Trump. He wrote children's books in which King Donald rules, and his 
loyal little functionary Kash brings justice to him by pursuing the 
slugs of the FBI. Really?
  When the FBI is asked to investigate corruption in Trump world, do 
you think Kash Patel will rise to the occasion or do you think he will 
participate in a coverup? All you have to do is look at his own conduct 
and his own history.
  This is not Democrats saying this. What we are doing is relating what 
he has said and what he has done. This is Kash Patel on Kash Patel.
  He spread the really abhorrent lie that Federal law enforcement was 
behind January 6. On one of the many podcasts and interview shows where 
he spewed so much disinformation and partisan vitriol, he was asked: 
``It looks like you have a preponderance of evidence suggesting there 
may have been federal law enforcement involved in making [January 6] 
happen.''
  Patel's response: ``I'll get you to beyond a reasonable doubt.''
  ``[B]eyond a reasonable doubt.'' He believed and said Federal law 
enforcement Agencies were behind January 6. We know that is 
preposterous. We know that is false. We know that investigations have 
shown that none of that is even remotely true. That is completely false 
information. Yet here he is spouting it, and that is what he is going 
to look like as FBI Director too.
  The FBI is going to have to appear before judges and convince judges 
of the probity of the Agency, of the legitimacy of the Agency, of the 
propriety of the investigation and that the Department has done a fair 
job of marshaling the evidence.
  Here is what he says about judges: We have to start impeaching judges 
if they have ruled against Donald Trump.
  They were a political terrorist, in his view. In any case that Donald 
Trump has been charged in, almost every judge is handling this thing as 
if they were not a judge but a political terrorist. And, of course, he 
meant the Trump judge down in Florida as the only one excepted. When 
you start talking about judges that way, you can't then expect judges 
not to pay attention when you come before them in trying to do the work 
of the FBI.
  Then there is the question of what his former colleagues have said 
about him. These are things that he has said himself. What have his 
former colleagues said about him, every single one a Trump appointee?
  John Bolton, National Security Advisor: I didn't think he was 
qualified. I was forced to hire him.
  Political pressure jammed him into the job, and Bolton said: I didn't 
want any part of this guy. I was forced to hire him.
  With Attorney General Bill Barr, they tried to force him on Bill Barr 
as Deputy Director of the FBI, and he said that Patel had virtually no 
experience that would qualify him to lead the FBI. He said: ``Over my 
dead body'' does he get that job.
  These are the job recommendations of his own colleagues that show his 
unfitness.
  Over at the CIA, they tried to stuff him in someplace, and the 
Director of the CIA, Gina Haspel--I am no friend of Gina Haspel, but 
here is what she said about him: If he came over, she would resign 
before allowing Patel to assume a position as her Deputy.
  This is a guy who has a record of engagement with Trump appointees 
that shows that he is not qualified, not capable, and somebody over 
whom they would resign before they would let work for them. And now we 
are supposed to let him work for the American people? It is ridiculous.
  He testified once in State court on a Trump-related case, and his 
testimony was, to put it mildly, not convincing.
  Here is what the judge said:

       The court finds that Mr. Patel was not a credible witness. 
     His testimony . . . is not only illogical . . . but 
     completely devoid of any evidence in the record.

  OK. People come into court. They lie, and the court doesn't believe 
their nonsense. Statements like this happen all the time in court. But 
here is where they don't happen: They don't happen with Federal law 
enforcement agents. When I was the U.S. attorney in Rhode Island, if 
one of my FBI agents had gone over into the U.S. district court in 
Rhode Island and testified in a criminal case in such a way that one of 
the U.S. district judges said about that witness that he was not a 
credible witness and that his testimony was illogical and devoid of 
evidence in the record, we would be looking into that.
  This comes darned close to being what is called Giglio material--
material that the government is forced to disclose to future defendants 
when it bears on the credibility of a government witness, an agent who 
is a government witness. People lose their careers over Giglio 
material.
  This, if he were an FBI agent, would have caused a response at 
headquarters to say: What the hell is going on? How did one of our 
people get involved in such vagrantly fake testimony that he was called 
out by the judge in a case like this?
  This is the person they want to put in charge of the organization 
whose probity and whose professionalism and whose integrity are 
essential to the successful working of the organization? The guy was 
basically called out as a liar and a fraud in plain court. This guy is 
a hot mess.
  When you have a character like this who lies in court and who runs 
chain-saw memes about your opponents, about whom every person he tried 
to work with who was senior in the Trump administration said: Get this 
bum out of here; I don't want to be anywhere near him--that is a 
record.
  To you all, my Republican friends who are going to vote on this guy, 
when he gets there and he does what his character tells us he will do, 
don't think this isn't going to come back to haunt you.
  By the way, don't think that his ``Trumpservience'' as FBI Director 
won't turn on you. Just because he is a vitriolic partisan who despises 
Democrats doesn't mean that when Trump's ire moves someplace else--to 
Republican officeholders--he won't be there to deliver the FBI as an 
enforcer against you. So there is a lot to be concerned about.
  I will close with this: Never before in the history of American law 
enforcement has somebody sought to attain a high position in American 
law enforcement who has pled the Fifth Amendment. Not only did he plead 
the Fifth Amendment, but he refused to tell the committee what it was 
all about. You can't plead the Fifth unless you have a reasonable 
expectation that could put you in jeopardy of a crime. What crime? How 
in jeopardy? Explain that. You are not just a normal person; you are 
trying to be the head of the FBI.
  In a civil case, pleading the Fifth entitles the judge to instruct 
the jury to draw an adverse interest about your testimony that the jury 
can find against you because you took the Fifth.
  Why have we not had a straight answer yet from our Republican 
colleagues about why the guy who wants to be the head of the FBI pled 
the Fifth? It is an unprecedented, terrible situation.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.

[[Page S1073]]

  

  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I want to begin where my wonderful 
friend and colleague Senator Whitehouse of Rhode Island ended in 
opposing the nomination of Kash Patel to be Director of the FBI.
  I served as a U.S. attorney as well, and I know firsthand what an 
investigation and a prosecution can do to an individual's life even 
without a conviction. I used to tell my staff that the most important 
thing we decide to do is to start an investigation or bring charges 
because that person will be under a magnifying glass, having to defend 
himself even if no charges are brought and to defend himself even if 
there is no conviction, and the charges themselves can do irreparable 
harm to a person's reputation, his finances, his family, his life.
  We entrust these positions, investigative and prosecutorial, to 
people who deserve the credibility and reliance that we give them. So 
the position of Director of the FBI or Attorney General of the United 
States or prosecutors and investigators who work for them are not 
ordinary positions. Even potentially in certain situations, they are 
more powerful than a member of the U.S. Cabinet in the impact they can 
have on individual lives.
  For the ordinary nominee, any of the defects in character or 
experience or performance in past jobs would have been disqualifying. 
We live in a time that is not ordinary, and this nominee is not normal. 
I have never seen any nominee to a position of significant 
responsibility that has as many disqualifying factors in his or her 
background, but I think that one comment about him that strikes me 
whenever I read it is the full quote from former National Security 
Advisor John Bolton.
  Part of that quote has been cited by previous speakers. I want to 
read the whole quote:

       [Kash Patel's] conduct in Mr. Trump's first term and 
     thereafter indicates that as FBI director he would operate 
     according to [Secret Police Chief] Lavrenty Beria's reported 
     comment to Joseph Stalin: ``Show me the man, and I'll show 
     you the crime.''

  Now, very few people remember Secret Police Chief Beria and the 
terror he caused in carrying out Joseph Stalin's edicts to destroy 
people's lives, to execute them, to eliminate their families but 
remember the mantra of Beria and Stalin: ``Show me the man, and I'll 
show you the crime''--make up the crime to fit the man, and we will 
eliminate him.
  We are talking here about a nominee who has an enemies list. He calls 
it something different. He calls it ``Government Gangsters,'' and he is 
on a manhunt for them. ``Manhunt'' is his word. He can use different 
words, but the point here is he is on a mission to use the powers of 
this office, in Donald Trump's name, for political retribution against 
his enemies, against Trump's enemies, against MAGA's opponents. To use 
these institutions for political retribution is the height of 
irresponsibility. Even to hint at it ought to be disqualifying, and he 
has made it explicit in his past writings and his statements and 
speeches not just a couple of times. It is a theme that runs through 
his public comments; that eliminating enemies through the use of 
prosecution is not only acceptable but it is desirable.
  The FBI is a very special Agency, with 38,000 civil servants, 
including 13,000 special agents who go after international and domestic 
terrorism, cybercriminal syndicates, foreign espionage, organized 
criminal enterprises, including drug cartels, child sexual 
exploitation, and human trafficking, and many other crimes that affect 
our lives and the lives of everyday Americans across the country.
  All different backgrounds, races, and religions can be victims of 
crime that the FBI investigates. And the FBI agents put their lives on 
the line because pursuing these crimes often puts them at risk from bad 
guys who may not even know that they are shooting at an FBI agent, but 
it is somebody pursuing them; they may not know that an FBI agent is 
operating undercover, and they may be killing them. And so the FBI's 
work is a dangerous business, but it is for our good and our safety.
  The American people deserve an FBI leader who is worthy of them. The 
American people deserve a Director of the FBI who will keep them safe 
and who will make that safety a priority.
  But in recent weeks, the Trump administration has systematically 
weaponized and politicized both the FBI and the Department of Justice. 
On her very first day of office, Attorney General Bondi created a 
Weaponization Working Group--let me repeat that: Weaponization Working 
Group--and specifically named targets to be investigated: Letitia 
James, Alvin Bragg, Jack Smith. All of them have led legitimate 
prosecutions and lawsuits against President Trump.
  There have been reports that prosecutors and FBI agents have been 
reassigned from drug trafficking to do immigration enforcement, from 
terrorism task forces to immigration enforcement. And the 
administration has issued allegedly unethical or illegal audits, 
causing many top prosecutors to bravely resign rather than betray their 
oaths of office. We are talking about men and women who love their jobs 
in the Department of Justice and do them well, and they have sacrificed 
those jobs because they were ordered to take action that was unethical 
or illegal, in their view.
  We need--now more than ever--an FBI Director who is trustworthy and 
devoted to the ideals and values of the Department of Justice and the 
Constitution above all. Anyone taking one of those jobs raises their 
right hand and swears an oath to the Constitution--not to the 
President, not to the Attorney General, not to any other official; it 
is to the Constitution.
  Kash Patel is not that person, not the person to have that immense 
responsibility, most especially at this moment. He lacks the judgment; 
he lacks the integrity; he lacks the character and competence to be FBI 
Director. Kash Patel's contempt for those agents who put their lives on 
the line has been clear. He has called them--the FBI--``one of the most 
cunning and powerful arms of the Deep State.''
  And there are now highly credible whistleblower reports that he may 
have directed the purging of senior leaders at the FBI as well as 
potentially a mass firing of career FBI officials--those FBI officials 
who served professionally, with distinction, who put their lives on the 
line, purged as a result of Kash Patel involving himself, in fact, in 
those decisions even as, under oath, in response to my questions, he 
said:

       All FBI employees will be protected against political 
     retribution. [All FBI employees will be protected against 
     political retribution.]

  Well, we stood in front of the FBI headquarters this morning. In that 
very building, there are individuals who will be fired because they 
took assignments they didn't choose; they were assigned to criminal 
investigations that happened to involve Donald Trump--political 
retribution at its very height. And if he directed the purging of those 
FBI agents, contrary to the assurances he made to our committee at his 
nomination hearing, Kash Patel was certainly less than truthful with 
us.
  I have not been without criticism of the FBI. None of us have been. 
No Agency is perfect. But I am also betting that members of the FBI 
would say there is room for improvement in this Agency.
  Kash Patel would slash and trash the FBI, not improve it. He would 
engage in political retribution, not constructive reform. He would 
weaponize the FBI with that enemies list. He may not say it is an 
enemies list. He may call them government gangsters, but that manhunt 
would involve political retribution.
  And he has conspiracy theories. He has trafficked in them. He said he 
agrees with a lot of what QAnon says. He engages in election denialism, 
refusing to say that President Biden won the 2020 election. He has even 
suggested that the FBI planned the January 6 attack on the Capitol. And 
he has glorified those rioters by calling them ``political prisoners'' 
and, in fact, aiding them in their defense--even the rioters who 
attacked and assaulted police officers and did them grave injury and in 
some instances contributed to their death.
  He has joined them in song, producing the J6 Choir's recording, and 
he has refused to be honest when it really matters, pleading the Fifth 
Amendment in the case about Donald Trump's handling of classified 
documents and then denying us--or at least refusing to

[[Page S1074]]

cooperate in providing us with access to the testimony that he offered.
  The litany of questionable comments and actions by this nominee shows 
he lacks the character and competence for this job. I have talked about 
roughly half a dozen various different facts in his background, 
statements, comments, actions that would be individually disqualifying. 
All together, they paint a picture of someone who has no proper role 
anywhere near a law enforcement agency, let alone Director of the FBI.
  I am appalled that my Republican colleagues voted for him in 
committee unanimously on their side. I am appalled that so few may vote 
against him on the floor today. But I am absolutely sure of this one 
thing: This vote will haunt anyone who votes for him. They will rue the 
day they did it.
  To my Republican colleagues, think about it. Think about what you 
will tell your constituents--more important, your family, and maybe 
your grandchildren--about why you picked and voted for this person who 
will so completely and utterly disgrace this office and do such great 
damage to our Nation's justice system.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont.
  Mr. WELCH. Mr. President, I ask permission to speak up to 10 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. WELCH. Mr. President, I oppose Kash Patel. I believe he is the 
dangerously wrong choice to serve as Director of the FBI.
  We all have great admiration for the FBI. The men and women there 
serve our Nation, do hard work every day. For decades, they have served 
as the nonpolitical Agency that protects us and defends the rule of 
law.
  I believe that Mr. Patel is on a mission to wreck the FBI. It is his 
own words. He wants to turn the FBI building into a monument or museum 
to the deep state. You know, I believe that this country and Congress 
is in the midst of a slow-moving but rapidly accelerating 
constitutional crisis. This is real, and we can ignore it or see it.
  It began most visibly, of course, on January 6, 2021, when two norms 
of this Republic--the peaceful transfer of power and the renunciation 
of violence to affect the outcome of the vote count and certification--
were breached, and where many Members of the House and Senate also 
voted against certifying the election of the person chosen by the 
people in their own States.
  The President continues to say that the election was stolen, and he 
has coached his nominees to embrace the big lie. The first month of the 
Trump administration has shown the contempt for the Constitution and 
the acceptance of lawlessness that is dangerous to the future of our 
Republic.
  President Trump's election denialism was an early sign of his 
disregard for the norms and requirements of the Constitution. Now 
empowered in a second term by a Congress and a judiciary which refuse 
to assert their independence, Mr. Trump has enacted Executive order 
after Executive order to dismantle our institutions. He doesn't have 
the authority to do what he is doing: the Federal funding freeze, 
clearly an unconstitutional invasion of the article I power of the 
purse; shutting down Agencies created by Congress without authority; 
revoking birthright citizenship, a constitutional provision that he 
asserts that he can do by Executive order; removing leaders of 
independent Agencies created by Congress, clearly unlawful; firing 
inspectors general in violation of notice requirements created by 
Congress, unlawful; firing government employees who have civil service 
protections, clearly unlawful; and pushing really a quid pro quo order 
at the Department of Justice to drop charges against a corrupt mayor in 
New York so he will accede to whatever the wishes are of the Trump 
administration regarding local enforcement. That is only a short list.
  We have reached a point where a Federal judge has found that the 
White House defied his order to release billions of dollars in Federal 
grants, marking the first time that a judge has expressed and declared 
that the Trump administration is disobeying a judicial mandate. That is 
troubling. The country is headed into a situation where in addition to 
acting without authority, the President and his enablers are--he will 
defy rulings from the third branch of our government.
  Vice President Vance has made it very clear what his point of view is 
on judges: Judges aren't allowed to control the executive's 
``legitimate powers,'' and if the courts don't like it, let them 
enforce it.
  Of course, under our Constitution, since Marbury v. Madison, the 
court is--the court is the final arbiter of what is legitimate or what 
is not, and the executive branch must enforce the laws as interpreted 
by the coequal branch of government.
  It is my view that this administration is showing maximum contempt 
for core constitutional values, including, most importantly, the 
separation of powers. This is not about what the President's agenda is. 
This is about his disregard about the limits that apply to each branch 
of government.
  We have a dilemma. There are many in Congress that are fully in 
support of President Trump's policies. That is his right to pursue 
them, any Member's right to support them, but it has to be that we 
accept our unique responsibility, each of the 100 U.S. Senators, that 
we have to guarantee that in pursuit of those policies, it is done 
within constitutional boundaries.
  That is the glue that has held this country together through thick 
and thin for nearly 250 years. You know, this is not just talk about 
civic aspiration. It is a recognition that the separation of powers, 
that the system of checks and balances--we are custodians of that, each 
of us here--that the concept of the Executive's ambition should be 
matched with the ambition of the legislature. That is what has held us 
together through the turmoil of our own history.
  We have fierce debates about important public policy matters, but 
what allows us to resolve those, despite intense disagreements, is 
staying within the guardrails of the Constitution. That process is 
being threatened directly and aggressively. The President's attack on 
our Constitution on January 6 has continued to this day.
  We have witnessed the renunciation of the decision the American 
people made in the 2020 election by President Trump's nominees. Many of 
them who came before us, including Mr. Patel, were unable to simply say 
who won the 2020 election. They continued the ``Stop the Steal'' 
narrative even 4 years later, and now we have President Trump in his 
first month in office acting in ways that continue to challenge the 
constitutional order.
  I am voting against Mr. Patel, primarily but not exclusively, because 
he is clearly an instrument in that effort to continue eroding the 
precepts of the Constitution on separation of powers. I urge all my 
fellow Senators, Republican and Democrat, to embrace the responsibility 
we have to assert our responsibility and authority as a coequal branch.
  This is a difficult time, particularly for many of my esteemed 
colleagues on the Republican side. You may support, as I mentioned, the 
policies of the President, but we have got to take a look at how he is 
going about trying to implement them. That really matters.
  We are all custodians of the constitutional order. I am regarding 
what President Trump has been doing in his first month of office as an 
illegal rampage. It is a rampage of illegality. He is showing a 
contempt for Congress and a contempt for the U.S. judiciary.
  Mr. Patel has signed on to that agenda. He isn't just someone who 
will be forced to participate in the President's campaign of 
retribution. He is an active participant. He has got his enemies list.
  We know this because his own words said:

       What was the FBI doing planning January 6th for a year?

  No basis for that, other than to set up the attack on the good men 
and women of the FBI.
  Mr. Patel is the one who created a list of deep state individuals. 
This is like Russia kind of stuff, half of whom are Republicans in the 
so-called deep state. Then he called them ``nothing more than a cabal 
of government gangsters and their allies.''
  This is the Department he is going to be leading, really. He is the 
one who said ``thank you to President Trump for helping put so many 
government gangsters in their place.''

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  Mr. Patel is not the person to lead the FBI. My hope is that all of 
us should consider what Mr. Patel will do. He is going to use the power 
of the FBI to go after all those in government, those in the media, and 
those across the country that he doesn't agree with. He cannot serve as 
the next Director of the FBI.
  I yield the floor.