Why FBI Officials Are Worried About the Midterms
· The Atlantic
Subscribe here: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | YouTube | Overcast | Pocket Casts
Visit playerbros.org for more information.
The word that the Atlantic staff writer Sarah Fitzpatrick hears often from her FBI sources is desperate, meaning that they believe FBI Director Kash Patel is desperate to please President Trump. What Trump wants, sources from the agency and the Justice Department concluded, is proof that he actually won the 2020 presidential election and punishment for those he believes conspired to deny him victory. Sources told Fitzpatrick that nervous agents have sought counsel in recent weeks about how to respond to FBI directives related to the midterms.
Fitzpatrick has published a series of revelations about the FBI under Patel’s leadership. In April, she reported that Patel had “alarmed colleagues with episodes of excessive drinking and unexplained absences.” Patel called the story a “lie” and filed a $250 million defamation suit against The Atlantic. On Radio Atlantic, she discusses what agents and other sources are telling her about how the mission of the FBI has changed, how resources have been diverted to exploration of long-debunked election-conspiracy theories, and what most worries them about this moment. The FBI has responded to Fitzpatrick’s reporting by calling it “false” and stating that the FBI is “united.”
The following is a transcript of the episode:
Hanna Rosin: “Is There Anything Kash Patel Won’t Do for Trump Before the Midterms?” That’s the title of a recent story by staff writer Sarah Fitzpatrick, who covers the FBI. She spoke to FBI agents and other sources who told her that Patel is, quote, “desperate” to help the president get what he wants, which one source told her was indictments, people in handcuffs.
I’m Hanna Rosin. This is Radio Atlantic. Over the last few months, The Atlantic, and Sarah Fitzpatrick in particular, has published a series of revelations about Kash Patel’s leadership at the FBI.
Back in April, Sarah reported that Patel had alarmed colleagues with episodes of excessive drinking and unexplained absences, a story that got a lot of attention. Patel called the story a lie, and he filed a $250 million defamation suit against The Atlantic. Sarah is joining us today to discuss her reporting on the FBI and the midterms.
Sarah, welcome back to the show.
Sarah Fitzpatrick: Thanks for having me.
Rosin: From your reporting, you learned that under Kash Patel’s leadership, the agency is approaching elections differently. What did you discover?
Fitzpatrick: In interviews with over 40 sources across the FBI and across Washington, they described an FBI that has fundamentally changed its core mission into essentially acting in many cases on behalf of the president and pursuing things that are in the White House’s interest, not in their traditional role around elections.
Rosin: And what did the agents you spoke to find alarming about this new focus?
Fitzpatrick: They found it incredibly alarming to the point that I think there was a real level of apprehension and terror that I had not sensed, even in my prior reporting. This was something new, and this was a real concern that there was a lack of information about what would happen on Election Day.
And a real concern that they were gonna be asked to do things that may be counter to what they had long been instructed to do as agents of the FBI, specifically around elections.
Within the FBI, it is such a sacred thing. There are so many rules and laws and ways to make sure that there is no appearance of the federal government ever putting a finger on the scale around elections.
And I think the concern among the workforce, and those familiar with what the FBI’s plans are, is a real lack of clarity, and in that vacuum is a sense of concern.
Rosin: And did people you spoke to bring up specific scenarios, like before the polls, long before the elections, after the polls?
Fitzpatrick: Yes.
Rosin: Did they spin things out?
Fitzpatrick: Absolutely. I mean, I think there’s a concern right now, given the FBI’s incredible amount of resources that they have devoted to election-related investigations. These range from things like going back over election conspiracies that have long been disproven, and making agents go over and over and over the same things with no new information, as far as we can tell, to investigations into people that the president or others around him find to have been—that they believe were part of a grand conspiracy—and to go after those individuals and to find reasons to indict them, essentially.
So there’s a kind of concern about how the FBI is—what they are prioritizing, what they’re using resources for, and whether or not that is an appropriate application of the law. I think there’s also a great concern among—because normally the FBI does a lot of preparation for Election Day. There are briefings; there are trainings.
The major one is around this idea that, how do we protect election locations and people involved in elections?
Rosin: That’s in the past. That would be the normal course of operation.
Fitzpatrick: That would be the norm.
Rosin: Right, right.
Fitzpatrick: That would be the norm. There’s a tremendous amount of that, and it’s a real focus on civil liberties and protection.
Rosin: Mm-hmm.
Fitzpatrick: That has not happened thus far, and we’re a couple weeks out from the election. There has been one large-scale training, which was titled “Election Integrity,” and the vast majority of that training, as far as I’ve been able to discern from my reporting, is that it was focused on illegal-immigrant voting, which, as we know, is a tiny, tiny, minuscule issue. And there wasn’t the same focus on making sure that the appropriate role of the FBI is followed on Election Day.
I’ve spoken to lots of agents and others within the bureau who have asked for guidance, who have asked for: What is going to be the plan? What do I need to be doing? And they are concerned that they are not getting the answers that they would expect.
And I think there’s a real concern among employees at the bureau about what it will look like after Election Day. And what will they be asked to do? What may the government—this White House—ask them to do? And I think there’s a real concern about that.
Rosin: And was there a specific scenario that anyone spun out to you? My greatest fear is X?
Fitzpatrick: One agent described, and we mention it in the piece, he says: “I’m either gonna be sick that day or they are going to have to fire me.” They are already preparing for what their red lines might be.
Rosin: Mm-hmm.
Fitzpatrick: Now, I think it’s important to be clear: There has been no specific guidance that has gone out, but the absence of that, given a bureau that is known for preparing so carefully, that’s making people nervous, and that ultimately goes to leadership.
Rosin: Right. Well, last month, Patel testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee, and the Democratic senators tried to extract a commitment from him that he would say no if the president tried to deploy federal agents to polling locations.
And as you—you’re nodding your head—they didn’t succeed.
Senator Richard Blumenthal: Can you commit to this committee that you will not send FBI agents to the polls on Election Day?
FBI Director Kash Patel: The FBI will follow the law. If there’s a reason to go there because there’s been a violation of the law, we will. Otherwise, we won’t.
Blumenthal: Would you agree with me that the FBI has no general authority to monitor elections?
Patel: That priority rests with DHS.
Blumenthal: So you would agree with me that deploying FBI agents to the polls on Election Day would be contrary to law?
Patel: I don’t know that we can’t legally do it. I’m telling you we’re going to house our agents and intel analysts in our field offices for election-security efforts.
Blumenthal: Well, I’m dissatisfied that you are unable to give us an unequivocal, clear, unambiguous commitment that the FBI will be kept out of election interference.
Fitzpatrick: I think it was a really alarming moment for members of Congress, and it was a really alarming moment for members of the bureau. I talked to a couple people who described what it was like to watch that in action, and they were a combination of just bewildered and distraught.
Like, this is such an easy question to answer. The law is clear. Why can’t he say it, and what does that mean?
Rosin: Speaking of the law, what are they legally allowed to do? What is the law around sending federal agents to polling locations?
Fitzpatrick: So officially, federal armed agents are not allowed to enter polling locations. The law is very, very clear. There’s a lot of case history around this. There are specific examples potentially in which there would be a threat to life, but the conditions that need to be met in order for that to happen are quite extreme.
Rosin: Now, you’ve implied in our conversation that the pressure’s coming from the White House. Why did you conclude that, and what did people tell you they’ve been hearing?
Fitzpatrick: Everyone I spoke to around this story, and I spoke with more than 40 people, described instances in which the orders that were given were described as: This is coming from the White House. This is a presidential priority. This is important for 47.
It was explicit that this was the case, and that also is an incredible departure from the FBI under any administration prior. They spend a tremendous amount of time and energy making sure that it doesn’t even appear that they have any contact with the White House.
And this is one of the questions that we asked. You know, Has the bureau followed the rules about who’s supposed to be talking to the White House and not? They claim that they have. Our reporting suggests otherwise.
Rosin: All right, let’s get specific about that. Under previous administrations, at least in my memory, agencies actually take pains to—
Fitzpatrick: Yes.
Rosin: —to portray themselves as independent—
Fitzpatrick: Yes.
Rosin: —and apolitical. What has this agency done under Kash Patel—things that you found out but also things that have been publicly reported—that depart from that tradition?
Fitzpatrick: I mean, first of all, you have a director that is appearing with the president at events in which it appears—there’s this particular event that we talk about in the piece, a rally, essentially a Trump rally at a police-training academy.
Patel: President Trump’s mission to make America safe again, as he campaigned; he is delivering on that promise, and it is such an honor to be here in Nassau County, back in my home, when he’s about to walk onstage and give you the latest update on the statistics.
Fitzpatrick: And the fact that you had the attorney general and the director of the FBI up there—and not just, not just there, but personally thanking the president.
Patel: President Trump, thank you for backing law enforcement. Thank you for funding law enforcement. Thank you for loving law enforcement. Thank you for relentlessly pursuing the mission of justice with the warriors of justice across this country.
Fitzpatrick: You know, saying, The president reads about every single case that we work on. That’s not supposed to be happening. If that’s happening, that’s a real problem on every level.
Rosin: And play that out for me. I saw that—is the departure, like, in tone, or the way that he appears, or the way that he praises the president, or just the very fact that he appears?
Fitzpatrick: The very fact.
Rosin: The very fact that he appears at a public event that feels like a political rally.
Fitzpatrick: The very fact that you would be with the president, that you would be photographed with the president really at all. I think previous FBI directors have described to me how they would take all these pains to avoid that and would not even come visit the White House, in many cases. That’s not what’s happening here.
Rosin: How did Patel and the agency in general respond to this reporting when you asked them about it? It’s strange, a little bit funny.
Fitzpatrick: It was really strange.
Rosin: Yeah.
Fitzpatrick: I still don’t fully understand it, to be honest. It’s one of the most odd responses I’ve ever received.
Essentially, we sent—I sent—three pages of very, very detailed questions about what we planned to report, and Director Patel’s response was about a golden Jet Ski, and asking if I had found his golden Jet Ski.
Rosin: Which you hadn’t.
Fitzpatrick: I hadn’t.
Rosin: No. It’s not one of the things you’ve —
Fitzpatrick: I’ve actually never reported on Jet Skis.
Rosin: Yeah. (Laughs.)
Fitzpatrick: I wasn’t aware that he had lost one, but I’m happy to help if he needs help.
Rosin: Mm-hmm.
Fitzpatrick: But I think it was, you know—it was a reference to what we think was another news organization’s reporting that had nothing to do with the story, which was very odd for someone whose job it is to be precise about facts.
Other executives at the FBI did respond. They said that the reporting was false. They emphasized that this was a united FBI. But it was very curious: All of the people who submitted these responses had almost identical language, right down to the words.
Rosin: Which was “false.”
Fitzpatrick: “False,” “united.” It was unlike any response I’ve ever received in my many years of reporting.
Rosin: In its flipness?
Fitzpatrick: Its flipness and its—it’s a lack of engagement in detail.
Rosin: Right.
Fitzpatrick: And I think, you know, my job as a journalist is to gather as much information, to engage. Normally, you know, it’s a constant back-and-forth.
And, you know, on something so important as elections and Americans’ perceptions of elections, anxieties about this election, and federal law enforcement, it is odd. It’s very odd. It’s very concerning.
Rosin: And we should note that a spokesperson for the FBI denied that there were any internal concerns raised about the bureau’s approach to election investigations, and they said in a statement, “Election security is and will continue to be one of this FBI’s highest national security priorities, and we will make no apologies for any work to ensure every American citizen’s sacred right to vote is protected from criminal interference.”
[Music]
Rosin: After the break, why sources have described Kash Patel as, quote, “desperate” to help the Justice Department before the midterms.
[Break]
Rosin: I wanna go back to election-interference claims, which have a long history in this administration. Earlier this year, Patel announced that the Justice Department was gonna be making arrests in connection to 2020-election interference, and as we know, they haven’t made arrests. But your reporting found that it’s not for lack of trying. What did you discover they’d been doing in regards to the 2020 claims?
Fitzpatrick: They’ve been doing a lot in regards to the 2020 claims all over the country. There are a series of election-integrity investigations in which they have gone back and pursued conspiracies or theories from people who normally would not be providing information to the FBI, or that the FBI has already found it not to be credible.
But agents and other analysts, other FBI staff, were taken off of their responsibilities to go and do this work. In Fulton County, we have the example this summer of over 200 agents, I believe, were taken off of their responsibilities, worked nights and weekend, at tremendous cost to the taxpayer, to review ballots that had been seized by the FBI in January related to 2020. Our understanding is that nothing new or material came out of that investigation, and it took away people from doing really important work that helps keep people safe.
Rosin: And just to be clear, we’ve done some reporting on the Fulton County case on this show, and it’s not just been investigated by federal. It’s been investigated by state agencies. It’s been investigated many times over, and there wasn’t any evidence turned up—
Fitzpatrick: Exactly.
Rosin: —over these years that there was anything fraudulent.
Fitzpatrick: And I think one of the things that I report in the piece that I think really sent shock waves through the bureau, as well as other law-enforcement and intelligence agencies, is the fact that two people were walked out of the Atlanta field office for even raising questions about the process of what they were being asked to do.
And when we asked the FBI about that, they said they couldn’t comment on personnel but made a very curious comment that anyone who engages in weaponization no longer has a job here. And I think that speaks to a place that is demanding a certain level of what they believe, what has agents and others inside the bureau describe as loyalty. You have to show your loyalty.
And one person I spoke to recently, a private defense attorney, he described to me that he receives constant calls from people he used to work with in the bureau, because they are concerned about this election and what the FBI’s role in it may be. And he described people that are essentially—there is so much pressure to bend to this narrative, a narrative that has been debunked. But that’s what our FBI is spending their time on, much of their time on.
Rosin: And you also reported that people in the FBI and at the Justice Department are looking for guidance. Like, in what ways, and what kind of guidance?
Fitzpatrick: There’s a real absence of clear direction and clear information right now. And I spoke to multiple people who described sometimes having to be on, like, a goose chase trying to figure out, Okay, so who’s in charge of elections, and what should we be doing, and how should we be preparing?
And I was told of this message that was relayed from one Justice Department official to another. Someone was asking about the Justice Department manual, which is the list of very, very clear rules and guidance and procedures, and there’s an entire aspect of this specific to elections because it is so sacred and high-stakes. And this person was told, we quote—we say it in the piece—“I was told the Justice Manual isn’t a thing … There are no rules. Just make sure Republicans win.”
Rosin: Wow.
Fitzpatrick: Now, I asked the DOJ about that. They said that this is not and has never been department guidance. And I think, you know, that’s what people are getting alarmed by, that these are the messages that they’re getting, and they are really concerned.
Rosin: In your piece, you used the word desperate, as in people described Patel as “desperate” to help. Why desperate? That’s an extreme word.
Fitzpatrick: It is an extreme word. It’s a word that people used over and over in my conversations with them, and increasingly as time went on in this reporting. And I think it reflects this very precarious position that Patel finds himself in. We at The Atlantic have reported that he has been on the list of people that were believed to be close to being asked to leave.
We’ve reported that Patel himself has expressed that to other people and is very nervous about his place. But in a way, that is a feature, not a bug.
Often, sources will talk to me about: There’s an audience of one here. And that the president has asked him to do very specific things, and in order to keep this job, you know, what our sources tell us is that he is willing to do things that he feels that he must do. And that, you know, one source says to me, This is the guy—Patel’s the guy who never says no. And the president likes that.
Rosin: What are the tone of the sources you’re talking about? Is it mocking, worried, concern, a whole range of things?
Fitzpatrick: You know, I think it’s changed over time. Originally, when I first really started digging into the FBI, it would be a kind of mocking, a kind of, This is silly, but the work’s getting done. And over time, especially this summer, there was a real change. People started getting much more alarmed, concerned, bordering on sometimes a kind of Is there any use?—almost a kind of nihilism—and really describing a kind of paralysis in how they were feeling and how they were approaching that work. And that really made me take notice and feel that there was something that had shifted this summer in the preparation for the midterms.
Rosin: So that’s the evolution in the agents. I’m curious about the evolution in the precarity of Kash Patel’s position and what you know about that. When we spoke in April, it did seem as if his job were at risk.
Do you get a sense that that’s changed? Has he won the favors of the president? Do you know about that?
Fitzpatrick: Yes. I think that’s true.
Rosin: Uh-huh.
Fitzpatrick: I think that’s absolutely true. I think he has gone from being one of the most vulnerable members of the Cabinet to being perhaps one of the safest, because it’s very clear what the president wants, and he has demonstrated over and over again that he will use the resources of the FBI towards those purposes.
Rosin: Now, there has been some resistance. You mentioned some, but can you tell us who else resigned and what they said?
Fitzpatrick: So there’s been a kind of an ongoing, either people that are fired or people that are resigned almost on a weekly basis, and they sometimes come in waves. Interestingly, but we had a couple really interesting people resign recently.
Out of the blue, we had Andrew Bailey, who was one of the co–deputy directors of the FBI. He was brought in and was viewed by many in the bureau, but as well as within the White House, as the person who would be the successor to Patel eventually. And Bailey suddenly resigned. That was a surprise to even his closest staff.
And I think for a lot of people within the bureau, this was a really telling indicator of the direction that the bureau is going in. In part, I’m told from sources familiar, that Bailey was viewed as someone who was willing to discuss the Constitution; bring up Perhaps these are the limitations. Perhaps this is, you know—we should be aware of these things; and that he was, in many cases, a lone voice in that. And now I think that resignation has made those inside the FBI, especially in leadership, very concerned about who is going to say no to Patel.
Rosin: Since you mentioned Bailey, I should say that he’s pushed back against some of your reporting and your narrative.
Fitzpatrick: Yes. In a statement provided by the FBI press office, Bailey said that the reporting was false and said that—and it was specifically around questions about pushing back on proposed law-enforcement actions and the fact that he brings up the Constitution in meetings.
Rosin: There were also some other resignations you mentioned, which surprised me.
These were people who I thought would be maybe more sympathetic to claims of election interference, and they also left. What is that about?
Fitzpatrick: I think it’s a reflection of the fact that these investigations—so this is within the bureau but also primarily within the Justice Department. There is this giant investigation that’s been going on in South Florida that just keeps taking people from all over the government, so much money, so much time.
It is just, like, agents describe it as something that they try desperately to avoid getting picked up to. One person was telling me that they were, like, kind of having to come up with ever more creative excuses to not be in the office. Anyway, this investigation in South Florida is really kind of the nexus of the effort to use the federal government, the FBI and the Justice Department, to go after the president’s perceived enemies and those that he believes somehow contributed to his loss in [the] previous election.
We saw some of a mass—essentially a mass resignation, although the Justice Department has said that some of those were reassignments that were already planned, and that this is a real signal. It was designed to be a signal. And it was a signal that, according to sources that I spoke to, that the leadership of the Justice Department was asking them to move too quickly and asking them to do things by a certain timeline, which was prior to the midterm elections.
And for even these individuals, who are true believers, who truly do believe and have devoted their lives to correcting what they believe when it was improperly handled, they said, This is a step too far. You are asking me to do something that is not supported at this point by the evidence or the law.
Rosin: Interesting. Interesting.
Fitzpatrick: It’s a real—and one person described it to me as an effort to get the president’s attention.
Rosin: I wanna put this in some kind of broader context, because you and other people in The Atlantic have been warning and reporting for months about potential election interference.
First, a little historical context: J. Edgar Hoover. This is not the first time that the FBI has been accused of political interference, you know? He obviously helped build the modern FBI, and also, you know, went after activists. And so how is this moment in history a deviation from what’s been in the past?
Fitzpatrick: I think it is a deviation from a mission that was very clear, an oath to the Constitution and to protect American citizens, and that is what the FBI does. That is what it is trained to do. There’s a lot of time and energy for the leadership of the bureau. They spend, I would say, the vast majority of their time thinking about, How do we put guardrails around what we do?
And so I think a lot of the FBI’s history has been around creating reforms, having checks and balances, making sure that these things are carefully and cautiously applied in a way that keeps Americans safe, but also upholds their rights under the law. I think we are seeing a shift in what that mission is, and that mission is towards the president’s agenda in many cases, assisting with immigration enforcement, going after perceived political enemies, going after election-conspiracy theories. That is a radical departure.
Rosin: We’re only a few weeks from the midterms now. It seems like you’re gonna be vigilant. What will you be watching for? ’Cause we’ve described ways where it could really go off the rails, and we’ve also described ways that there are boundaries and checks. So what signs are you watching over the next few weeks about which direction it’s gonna go in?
Fitzpatrick: I’m watching for—I’m gonna be watching for resignations or firings. I’m gonna be watching for actual planning. What is the level of who’s being asked to be on call? What are they being asked to prepare for? Where are they being stationed, and why? I’m going to be watching for what threats the bureau is anticipating. There’s a real conflict within the bureau right now about how resources are devoted to what is considered antifa or extremism, and who gets—which cases are pursued and why. That’s gonna be a really telling indicator, I think. And ultimately, this is an administration that is very clear and transparent in many cases about what they plan to do and what they’re hoping to do, and we need to take them at their word.
Rosin: Well, Sarah, thank you so much for joining me today.
Fitzpatrick: Thank you.
[Music]
Rosin: This episode of Radio Atlantic was produced by Kevin Townsend and Jinae West with help from Mike Pesoli. It was edited by Claudine Ebeid. Rob Smierciak engineered and provided original music. We also had music from Breakmaster Cylinder. Claudine Ebeid is the executive producer of Atlantic audio, and Andrea Valdez is our managing editor.
Listeners, if you enjoy the show, you can support our work and the work of all Atlantic journalists when you subscribe to The Atlantic at TheAtlantic.com/Listener.
I’m Hanna Rosin. Thank you for listening.