Report: Senior FBI Leaders Directed to Leave as Trump Administration Takes Over

A handful of senior FBI officials are being asked to leave or resign — or otherwise face a forcible outing — according to reports.

CNN, citing “sources briefed on the matter,” reports at least six individuals in senior positions within the agency are facing the ultimatum: Resign or be fired.

Per the outlet:

The senior officials are at the executive assistant director level or special agent in charge level and include those who oversee cyber, national security and criminal investigations, the sources told CNN. Some were notified while Kash Patel, President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the agency, sat answering questions from senators for his confirmation hearing Thursday.

This move comes as others within the FBI face the potential of being removed due to their involvement in investigating January 6 or the classified documents case, the outlet added. Meanwhile, the Department of Justice has already fired over a dozen prosecutors who worked on cases targeting former President Donald Trump.

Acting Attorney General James McHenry said in a memo that, essentially, those individuals could not be trusted to carry out Trump’s agenda, given their past work.

“Given your significant role in prosecuting the president, I do not believe that the leadership of the department can trust you to assist in implementing the president’s agenda faithfully,” the memo read in part.

All of these actions align with Trump’s day one order focused on ending the weaponization of the federal government.

“It is the policy of the United States to identify and take appropriate action to correct past misconduct by the Federal Government related to the weaponization of law enforcement and the weaponization of the Intelligence Community,” the executive order titled “ENDING THE WEAPONIZATION OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT” reads.

It adds that Americans witnessed “a systematic campaign against its perceived political opponents, weaponizing the legal force of numerous Federal law enforcement agencies and the Intelligence Community against those perceived political opponents in the form of investigations, prosecutions, civil enforcement actions, and other related actions.”

The news coincides with Trump’s nominee for director of the FBI, Kash Patel, testifying before a Senate panel on Thursday and clashing with Democrat Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), who offered a barrage of incomplete quotes throughout her testy line of questioning.

She said in part:

You wrote that the FBI has become so thoroughly compromised that it will remain a threat to the people unless drastic measures are taken. Do you know that under Chris Wray’s leadership, he took over at a very difficult time. We all know that, appointed by President Trump, that the during his tenure, the applications to the FBI has, in fact, tripled. Do you think people would be applying to that agency like in those numbers, if they thought it was so corrupt?

“The American public’s trust in it is 40 percent,” Patel responded. “That’s an all-time low.”

“Did you say that the FBI headquarters should be shut down and reopened as a museum of the deep state?” Klobuchar asked as Patel finally had the opportunity to respond more fully.

“If the best attacks on me are going to be false accusations and grotesque mischaracterizations, the only thing this body is doing is defeating the credibility the men and women at the FBI,” Patel said.

“I stood with them here in this country, in every theater of war we have. I was on the ground in service of this nation, and any accusations leveled against me — that I would somehow put political bias before the Constitution — are grotesquely unfair,” he continued.

“And I will have you reminded that I have been endorsed by over 300,000 law enforcement officers to become the next director of the FBI,” Patel added. “Let’s ask them.”