Since its entry into office on February 20, Patel seems to have made three flights on FBI planes in Nashville, Tennessee, where girlfriendA country singer, lives; Two flights to Las Vegas, where he has a house; And a flight to New York, where he attended a professional hockey match. FBI policy in recent years has forced that directors are flying over government planes for security reasons.
Ben Williamson, an FBI spokesperson, confirmed the reduction of the director’s briefs from 8:30 a.m., but denied that Patel had arrived late during the morning meetings. He said that Patel still attends five morning meetings per week – including three smaller than the director of the director.
“This change was based on the comments of the people from the office – not the calendar or the attendance of the director,” said Williamson. “He still has 5 morning meetings per week. These meetings are essential to ensure the safety of America. ”
Williamson refused to comment whether the six trips cited by NBC News involved work activities and said that the new director was to remain by all FBI ethics rules.
“The FBI does not comment on travel arrangements for security purposes,” he said. “All ethical directives are rigorously followed.”
FBI officials said that the director’s weekly teleconference with the leaders of the field office was arrested after “leakage attempts” led to a series of news. But Patel always speaks regularly to the managers of the campaign office.
The two current FBI officials said that Patel did not seem interested in the equipment and that his intelligence briefs have trouble developing a briefing that attracts his attention. Williamson, the FBI spokesman, denied that Patel was not interested and said that the new director had worked tirelessly since he entered.
“The patel director works day and night to direct the office and protect the homeland,” he added. “The results so far are talking about themselves – and we are only just starting.”
Stacey Young, a former DOJ lawyer who co -founded Justice Connection, a group dedicated to supporting current and former MJ employees, said that current and former doj and FBI officials remain concerned about the patel approach.
“There is a growing feeling among the ranks that there is a vacuum of leadership,” said Young. “And that the highest levels of the office are more concerned with curling the favor of the president, reprisals and leaks than real work.”
Changes in the calendar of meetings
The team that prepares the director of the director tried to adapt to the patel calendar, said that the two and two former officials of the FBI and the Ministry of Justice are familiar with the issue.
“They had trouble trying to get the briefing in the morning because Patel could not arrive in time,” said a manager. “So now they have reduced the five -day briefing for only two days, Tuesday and Thursday. And even it was difficult.”
Some former FBI officials – some of whom are supporters of President Donald Trump – have challenged the dedication of a patel to employment.
“When you look at the things that people in America appreciate Donald Trump, if nothing else is the incredible quantity of work ethics he has,” said Kyle Seraphin, a former special agent of the Conservative FBI who had a close relationship with Patel But has since become a critic. “Then you have Kash Patel, which apparently takes time to make sporting events, make a lot of public appearances, appear with FIFA, go to the UFC, fly in our private jet.”
A long -standing patel partner who asked not to be appointed defended the new director. “I have known Kash for a long time,” they said. “The only thing he does late at night is to go to the gymnasium.”
Former FBI directors
After Patel took office, according to sources, FBI employees tried to maintain the morning routine of his predecessor, Christopher Wray. Former officials say Wray started his day in the J. Edgar Hoover building in downtown Washington by receiving an oral and written version of the president’s Daily Brief, or PDB, some of the most sensitive intelligences that the American government is collecting. They said Patel receives the PDB in written form every day.
At 8:30 am, FBI officials presented to Wray and his assistant the director of the director in what tended to be a large meeting full of senior officials who fixes the order of the office, according to the sources.
Wray generally crossed the street to the headquarters of the Ministry of Justice to brief the Attorney General Merrick Garland, according to former officials. They said that Patel sometimes has brief attorney general Pam leapi later in the morning.
According to the two FBI officials, FBI officials in charge of the director of the two -day -old director’s director try to adapt it to the interests of the Patel, according to the two FBI officials who know the question directly.
“So now, they are jostling by trying to manage a briefing of things that could be interested, which makes them draw products and change things,” said one of the civil servants.
An FBI official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive case, said that the claims that Patel was not interested in briefings was “not true.”
“I am myself with him in several of these meetings. He poses tons of questions and pushes the staff to arrive at this point and to present solutions,” said the official. “For a bad person who likes to block and chat at NBC News, it could be a lack of interest. This is not the case. This is effective over time and wanting to solve problems.”
Travel to professional events
Patel – who plays The defender every Sunday in a male hockey league in the Washington region – attended at least three NHL games while directing the FBI, according to photos published on social networks.
On April 6, Patel was spotted in New York Sitting next to the Super Wayne Gretzky hockey At night, Washington’s capital star Alex Ovechkin broke Gretzky’s record for career goals. Flight data show that an FBI plane landed at New York Kennedy Airport before the match and left.
Williamson said Patel is a longtime friend of Gretzky, adding: “Kash A and still supports his friends on and out of the ice.”
The flight files for the FBI planes do not include the names of the passengers, but they show four landings in Nashville, where the girlfriend of the patel has lived since early February and two landings in Las Vegas, where a house has a house.
On March 21, Patel posted on his X account on meeting with the senators and governor of Tennessee and visiting The Nashville FBI field office.
April 26, Patel dinner with The poker champion Mike Matusow and Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, according to An article on social networks by Matusow. Two days earlier, he trained at the headquarters of the Ultimate Combat Championship near Las Vegas with the former bodybuilding champion Miloš Šarčev, according to An article on social networks by Šarčev. An FBI jet landed in Las Vegas on April 24 and returned to the Washington, DC region on April 27, according to flight data.
On April 12, Patel went to Miami with Trump on Air Force One to watch A UFC match, having already assisted A UFC fight a few weeks earlier in Las Vegas, where he spent time with actor Mel Gibson.
Social networks and budget cuts
Some of the predecessors of the patel, included Wray and the former FBI directors, Robert Mueller and Louis Freeh, generally avoided the media and kept a low profile. Former FBI director James Comey had the reputation of looking for the spotlight and delivered speeches and interviews, but he was little online.
Patel, which is 44 and under than many previous directors, has a different approach. Active on social networks, a patel has sometimes dressed in FBI equipment and got involved in field agents, either in training or in certain real operations. Patel then posted photos From itself on various social media platforms, one of which is pulling a rifle on a FBI shooting field.
Recently, some FBI agents were dismayed to see that Patel was represented with an FBI agent insignia, said two former officials of the current FBI. Some agents argued that Patel has no right to wear a badge because it has not undergone the months of training.
Williamson, his spokesperson, said Patel had the right to do so. “The patel director is honored to serve as director of the FBI number 9 and to wear the badge,” said Williamson. “He works day and night to serve the American people and approach the growing number of threats to the country.”
Patel entered the FBI as a person who harshly criticized him as a corrupt and anti-top. But since he took the job, he sought to support the labor market, praise his achievements. So far, he has not inaugurated the type of radical change that his history suggested that he could.
Although a certain number of senior career leaders are drawn after Trump took up his dutiesUntil now, there has not been the kind of purge of generalized personnel at the FBI which has occurred in certain divisions of the Ministry of Justice.
Clutch announced a reorganization This has changed the structure of the FBI, but the changes do not seem to have fundamentally modified its operation.
The office has moved resources to reflect the Trump administration’s priorities to target Mexican drug cartels and Central American gangs, and FBI agents had to help immigration. But FBI agents also continue their traditional missions to combat terrorism, hunt spies and investigate various federal crimes.
On Thursday, however, in testimony of the Senate, Patel said that he supported a White House budget proposal which includes a 5% drop in the FBI budget.
“My opinion is that we will do and accept this budget as it is,” he said, “and make it work for the operational necessity of the FBI.”