The entirety of the Trump transition is divided over President-elect Donald Trump’s latest nomination – one for a post that is not even open, in naming Kash Patel as the next director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The FBI plays such a consequential role to policing big government that great pains have been taken to keep it removed from not only day to day politics, but even removed from election cycles. The director is appointed to ten year terms, overlapping any one presidency. Indeed, Donald Trump appointed Christopher Wray to the post and Joe Biden kept him in place. But now, not only is Donald Trump presuming to fire Christopher Wray several years early but proposes to do so with one of what people consider the most radical choices available – Kash Patel. The decision is even throwing Trumpworld into turmoil.
It is easy to see why this is of such a moment. The FBI is the world’s most powerful and sophisticated police force. It can create its own reality – in a sense. Any sort of political agenda immediately compromises its legitimacy in our system . And, according to the discussion today on Morning Joe, that’s the exact dynamic people sense and fear. Joe Scarborough noted: (Video below)
“Kash Patel is not just controversial among media outlets or Democrats, he is not just controversial among Republican senators. He is controversial inside Trump’s own orbit. You go inside Trump’s own orbit and it is split down the middle with half the people thinking he is going to be a disaster for any Donald Trump administration and they never wanted this nomination to see the light of day because, again, that divide goes straight through MAGA world for those around Donald Trump.”
So there are people inside Trump’s own camp who believe that Patel will be a disaster for Trump himself. They are not worried about the impact over the rest of the country so much as how it could even hurt his presidency. Perhaps they know that Trump tends to think with his gut – impulsively, and sometimes needs to be told “No – or at least let’s think about… ” in order to reconsider something later and not be immediately responsive. Jonathan Lemire agreed and said that the pick was to placate the hard right:
“People I talked to say this pick was a nod to the extreme right-wing portions of Trump base, the Steve Bannon, ultra-MAGA sector here who had been disappointed by Trump’s picks like treasury secretary and secretary of state,”
“This is Trump throwing them red meat because he knows he needs to keep them happy, but other people in Trumpworld are deeply worried about this pick, that Patel is not only not qualified but dangerous, that he will not think twice or hesitate in carrying out whatever Trump wants, people say, even for people breaking the law.”
And that is the breakdown in and of itself. Some do seem to fear that Patel will take the job with the presumption that he will more define the law than follow it – as dangerous an idea as any to exist in history. We know that in his first term, Trump would tell people to do something without fear as to whether it was legal because “I’ll pardon you… ” – which vitiates the entire idea of the law. “Do it anyway.” And the fear is that Patel won’t be looking to FBI attorneys about the legality of what they’re setting about to do.
There is also another troubling issue. It is pretty unlikely that Patel would be confirmed by the Senate – if only because there is such a strong tradition of leaving FBI directors in place term to term. But the Senate could hold Patel’s nomination up. In such a scenario, the fear becomes that Trump will appoint Patel to be “acting” director for less than a year and that “less than a year” will be more than enough:
“That seemed trouble and this seems hardly a sure thing, but if he were to fire Wray, Patel could step in in an interim way for 200 or so dayss. Even if he can’t be confirmed it will be enough to carry out some of Trump’s agenda.”
As to what portion of the “agenda” can be carried out in the next 200 or so days? That is the problem. Because the whole system is premised on the directorship being as resilient as possible to political pressure and thus big changes in the direction of the country would take place over periods of time, checked by Congress and courts. Anything done in 200 days or so would represent the type of changes that were heretofore thought impossible.
It all comes down to the agenda. Does Donald Trump intend to have the FBI work largely as it has for the last three to four decades? Have it be a very sophisticated, rich, specialized, highly dangerous, but ultimately apolotical body that – for the most part, has served this nation so well? Or will it become just another political extension? One with more power and technical know-how than anything similar outside of Russia or China?
We don’t know. We only know that Kash Patel has certainly made it sound as though he envisions the FBI as an extension of MAGA – the new police state. And that, you will note, will even turn out badly for Donald Trump, at least in the long run.
God Bless:Â I can be reached at [email protected] and @JasonMiciak and now on Blue Sky
Patel.and Giuliani look like escapees from.a mental asylum circa 1945.