As President-elect Donald Trump nominated Kash Patel for FBI Director, retired FBI Supervisory Special Agent Jeff Danik has voiced strong support for Patel, citing his extensive national security experience and commitment to depoliticizing the bureau’s leadership.
“This guy is completely and 100% qualified to run that organization. He’s what’s needed today. He’s the right fix,” Danik said in an interview with Just the News on Monday.
Danik highlighted Patel’s impressive career trajectory, which includes roles as a federal public defender, prosecutor, counterterrorism director at the National Security Council, senior counsel to the House Intelligence Committee, and chief of staff to both the Secretary of Defense and the Director of National Intelligence.
“He has the correct balance of prosecutor, defense attorney, and intelligence experience,” Danik said. “And personally, he’s been a victim of the system himself. That combination uniquely qualifies him for this role.”
Patel’s accomplishments include receiving the 2017 Assistant Attorney General’s Award of Excellence for prosecuting 12 Al-Shabab terrorists involved in deadly bombings in Uganda and a Central Intelligence Agency award for counterterrorism efforts in East Africa.
Danik also praised Patel’s pledge to “clean house” within the FBI’s upper management, where he believes political interference has undermined the agency’s mission.
“The top tier of the FBI has an outsized control over the entire organization, about 250 people,” Danik said. “These are high-ranking bureaucrats who often prioritize their ‘club’ over the bureau’s mission, leading investigations off course.”
He emphasized that most frontline agents are dedicated professionals working in challenging conditions. “The average day-to-day agent is doing heroic work despite the obstacles created by Senior Executive Service (SES) level agents,” he said.
Despite Patel’s qualifications, his nomination has drawn criticism from Democrats and media figures, who claim he would politicize the FBI.
Former Assistant FBI Director Frank Figliuzzi labeled Patel “wholly unqualified” in an op-ed for MSNBC, while The Atlantic writer Tom Nichols described his potential appointment as part of a “not-so-slow-motion authoritarian takeover.”
Ironically, critics of Patel have remained largely silent on past administrations’ actions involving journalists, including the Biden DOJ subpoenaing a reporter’s phone records and the Obama DOJ’s surveillance of Fox News journalist James Rosen.
FBI whistleblower Steve Friend, who testified about alleged political weaponization of the bureau, also endorsed Patel, calling him the right person to lead a “paradigm shift” within the agency.
“This is not a nonpartisan organization. We need a paradigm shift, and I think Kash Patel is the man to do it,” Friend said.
Friend criticized an FBI bonus system that rewards supervisors for meeting case quotas, arguing it incentivizes prioritizing numbers over justice.
Trump’s transition team has emphasized Patel’s mission to restore integrity to the FBI.
“Kash Patel is going to deliver on President Trump’s mandate to restore integrity to the FBI and return the agency to its core mission of protecting America,” transition spokesman Alex Pfeiffer said.
However, Patel’s nomination faces a significant hurdle: FBI Director Christopher Wray, who still has over two years left in his 10-year term. Advocates, including Mike Davis of the Article III Project, are calling for Wray to step aside voluntarily to facilitate the transition.
“Kash Patel represents a fresh start for an FBI in need of reform,” Davis said, pledging to rally support for Patel’s confirmation in the Senate.
The decision to nominate Patel marks Trump’s intent to reshape the FBI and refocus it on its core mission, signaling a major shift in leadership for the agency.