Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) on Monday pushed an anonymous smear about Federal Bureau of Investigation Director nominee Kash Patel just days ahead of his confirmation hearing on Thursday.
The post Dick Durbin Pushes Anonymous Smear that Kash Patel ‘Broke Protocol’ When Commenting on a Hostage Rescue appeared first on Breitbart.
Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) on Monday pushed an anonymous smear about Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director nominee Kash Patel just days ahead of his confirmation hearing on Thursday.
Durbin, in a letter sent to Trump administration officials dated January 27, 2025, said he received “highly credible information” that Patel “broke protocol” regarding hostage rescues when he commented to the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) “without authorization” about a successful hostage rescue during the first Trump administration in October 2020.
Durbin claimed the rescue of two Americans who had been held captive by Iranian-backed Houthi militants was still in progress when Patel commented to the newspaper. Durbin claimed that the WSJ published comments from Patel at 10:55 a.m. ET, several hours before the hostages were in confirmed custody of the U.S.
The WSJ reported that the two Americans were freed and that a Royal Oman Air Force plane carrying them and the remains of a third “flew out of Yemen’s Houthi-controlled capital of Sana’a, hours after the jet and a companion flight” had brought more than 200 Houthi loyalists back to Yemen. The paper cited U.S. and Saudi officials — not just Patel.
The report stated that Patel — then a deputy assistant to Donald Trump and senior director on counterterrorism at the White House National Security Council — worked on the deal, and quoted him as saying:
We had teams on the ground in both locations [Yemen and Oman] to ensure that there was a proper screening conducted of the people going back and that the cargo manifest was inspected so we could ensure the Saudis that no lethal aid was being provided and no known terrorist was being sent back.
Durbin said his office received allegations that “Mr. Patel inserted himself inappropriately in a hostage recovery mission and violated these protocols” and that he “allegedly had no role in the planning, negotiations, or execution of this hostage recovery.”
Former Trump National Security Counsel Chief of Staff Alex Gray called the anonymous allegations against Patel “baseless.”
Gray said in a statement:
The anonymous allegations in this letter are simply absurd to anyone who has ever actually worked with Kash Patel. In everything he did at the NSC and DoD, Kash put the interests of the American people, and particularly the interests of American hostages and unlawful detainees and their families, first. The success President Trump and his NSC had on the counter terrorism and hostage recovery missions was in no small part due to Kash’s skill and professionalism.
These baseless, anonymous allegations are contrary to every experience the Robert O’Brien-led NSC leadership had with Kash Patel, and are the last gasp of discredited political opponents of President Trump. Kash Patel is the most qualified National security professional ever nominated to lead the FBI, and his success at the NSC speaks for itself.
Durbin, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which will hold Patel’s confirmation hearing, requested information on hostage recovery protocols, records of communications between Patel and the Hostage Recovery Fusion Cell, interagency cables and memos concerning the rescue, and all records related to authorizing Patel to disclose details about the rescue.
Durbin requested the records by “no later than January 30” — the date of Patel’s confirmation hearing.
The senator opposed Patel’s confirmation since last week, however.
He posted on X on January 22: “I believe he has neither the experience, the temperament, nor the judgment to lead the FBI.”
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