Over the past four years, the FBI’s leadership has betrayed its mission, becoming a weapon in the hands of the radical Left against conservatives and people of faith and for numerous partisan interests. President-elect Donald Trump’s nomination of Kash Patel as FBI director is a crucial step toward cleaning up this embattled institution and restoring its integrity.
I have witnessed firsthand how Christopher Wray’s tenure as FBI director has been defined by dishonesty and a blatant disregard for the rule of law. During a 2023 House Judiciary Committee hearing, I listened as Wray insisted that a memo targeting Catholics for their faith originated from a “single field office” in Richmond, Virginia. Evidence we uncovered at the Judiciary Committee proved this was a lie. The memo was the product of multiple field offices, including Portland, Oregon, and Los Angeles. More shockingly, Wray presented a deceptively redacted version of this memo to Congress, hoping to cover up the full scope of the FBI’s targeting of Catholics.
The Catholic memo is just one example of this partisan weaponization at the FBI. The bureau also targeted parents protesting at school board meetings, labeling them “domestic terrorists.” It pursued conservative activists while ignoring rampant corruption and violent crime. And it shielded powerful elites, such as the Biden family, from scrutiny, refusing to investigate credible allegations of influence peddling and corruption.
Patel is the man who will fix this mess. As a former federal prosecutor, public defender, senior intelligence staffer, and chief of staff in the Defense Department, Patel has the expertise and courage to take on the entrenched corruption at the FBI, something the rank-and-file agents at the bureau have been calling for over the past four years. During his time on the House Intelligence Committee, Patel exposed unlawful surveillance practices within the FBI, including its role in the infamous Russia hoax, a politically motivated attempt to undermine Trump’s first term.
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Patel’s vision for the FBI is clear and bold: Dismantle the political cabal that has corrupted the bureau, end the harassment of conservatives and religious groups, and refocus the FBI on its core mission of fighting crime. Patel has pledged to send FBI agents back into the field to combat violent crime, human trafficking, and the drug epidemic tearing apart our communities. He will fire the legion of lawyers and bureaucrats who have turned the FBI into a partisan weapon and restore its commitment to justice and fairness.
This nomination is an opening salvo in Trump’s assault on the corrupt deep state and a necessary move to dismantle the weaponized bureaucracy that has plagued our nation. The FBI’s credibility is in shambles, with millions of people rightly viewing it as a rogue agency that targets citizens for their political and religious beliefs instead of upholding the rule of law. Patel has a proven record of exposing corruption and holding bad actors accountable, making him the perfect candidate to crush the deep state’s stranglehold on our institutions. Wray’s reign of deceit and partisan witch hunts is over. Patel will restore justice, refocus the FBI on real threats, and ensure that the agency serves the Constitution.
Lance Gooden represents Texas’s 5th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives.
This article was originally published at www.washingtonexaminer.com
