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Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., sharply criticized Kash Patel’s tenure as FBI director Wednesday, telling reporters that he viewed Patel’s leadership as deeply partisan and a “terrible tragedy” for the nation’s sprawling law enforcement agency.
Speaking at a news conference alongside former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and other House Democrats, Schiff took umbrage at Patel’s testimony one day earlier before the Senate Judiciary Committee — which Schiff said further crystallized his concerns about politicization within the bureau.
The FBI “has been the premier law enforcement agency in the country, and the world, because they’ve been constantly professional and non-partisan,” Schiff said Wednesday, noting the close working relationship he had with FBI agents during the years he spent as a federal prosecutor.
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“It is a terrible tragedy, I think, for the men and women of the bureau to have such poor leadership that is replacing expertise with incompetence, that is replacing non-partisanship with the most rabid partisanship,” Schiff told Fox News Digital. “And this is not unrelated to why we’re here today.”
His remarks come as Patel appeared on Capitol Hill Wednesday for a second day of testimony before the Senate and House Judiciary Committees.
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Both hearings were marked by sharp lines of questioning from Democrats, who grilled Patel on issues ranging from a flurry of FBI firings, the bureau’s handling of the Epstein files and concerns of politicization, among many other things.
Schiff, in particular, pressed Patel on his tenure at the FBI, saying the bureau’s agents — mostly assigned to its 52 field offices across the country and loath to see their work politicized — wanted to know what, if any, marching orders Patel had received from President Donald Trump.
The heated back-and-forth devolved into a shouting match between the two, as Schiff pressed Patel repeatedly over the firings of FBI agents and whether those individuals were removed for political reasons.
Patel, for his part, described Schiff as a “political buffoon.”
Speaking to reporters Wednesday, Schiff said Patel’s appearance did little to assuage his broader fears of weaponization within the bureau.
“You can’t have a vibrant democracy without the rule of law,” he told Fox News Digital. “You can’t have the rule of law if you have a weaponized FBI and a weaponized Justice Department — and sadly, that’s what we have here today,” Schiff said.
He also weighed in on Patel’s remarks yesterday on the Epstein files — another issue that sparked intense criticism from lawmakers, after Patel claimed Tuesday that there was “no credible evidence” that Jeffrey Epstein was trafficking women other than himself.
Schiff said it was a “startling claim,” particularly from someone who had previously promoted the belief that Epstein maintained a vast client list of powerful people.
“So it was completely contradictory to everything he said in the past,” he said. He also noted Patel’s “refusal” to answer his questions on why Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche declined to press Ghislaine Maxwell further on the Cabinet members she identified as being “close” to Epstein or having a relationship with him during a two-day interview in July.
“Blanche refused to ask who they were, and just ignored her comment.”
“And this is, again, the kind of incompetence we’re seeing,” he said, adding: “Incompetence is probably the most polite thing I can describe, but it certainly looks like a cover-up.”
The Justice Department and FBI have struggled to quell the mounting public pressure on them to release more information related to the Epstein investigation — underscoring the story’s sticking power in a fast-moving news cycle, and among Trump supporters, who have been some of the leading voices in demanding the information be released.
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