FBI Director Kash Patel and the Trump administration are leaving the U.S. vulnerable to espionage as they push the bureau to focus on immigration and adopt a more decentralized structure, former top agents are warning.
Under the Trump administration, the FBI has said it plans to relocate around 1,500 agents out of Washington, D.C., and has reassigned roughly a quarter of agents — up to 40 percent in some big-city field offices — to pursue immigration-related cases, rather than the bureau’s more typical anti-crime and national security work.
Together, these changes have left the bureau poorly equipped to tackle counterintelligence work, the former top agents warn, such as fending off espionage attempts from countries including China and Iran.
“It’s a disaster,” Robert Anderson, the former head of FBI counterintelligence, told The Bulwark. “I’m rooting for everybody because we’re all Americans, [but] Patel needs to wake up.”
“Patel is only paying lip service to the Chinese threat,” former FBI agent Frank Montoya, Jr., added, saying the all-out focus on deportations has “put a disaster in play.”
The Independent has contacted the FBI for comment.
Outside of the counterintelligence concerns Patel’s job itself reportedly could be under threat.
Last month, MS NOW reported that the president and his aides were upset with unfavorable news coverage about Patel’s leadership, including scrutiny over his use of government aircraft and the unusual security detail assigned to his girlfriend.
The White House has dismissed these reports as “fake news.”
Internally, a group of 24 active-duty and retired agents said the bureau under Patel is a “rudderless ship,” with the director “in over his head,” according to a report obtained by the New York Post.
One agent said the present climate inside the nation’s premier law enforcement agency has turned into the “Kash-Bongino circus,” the agents reportedly said, referring to Deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino, a former Secret Service agent and right-wing influencer.
Another alleged the FBI has been suffering from “paralyzing leadership at all levels.”
The FBI has also faced multiple lawsuits from agents who allege they’ve been fired for political reasons.
In addition to discontent within the FBI has faced turf wars in Washington.
A House bill proposes putting the office of Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard as the lead agency in charge of U.S. counterintelligence, a change the FBI is reportedly “strongly” against, according to communications with Congress obtained by The New York Times.
