FBI Director Kash Patel has accused the FBI of defrauding a secret surveillance court in order to obtain warrants used to monitor President Donald Trump and members of his inner circle during the 2016 presidential campaign and in subsequent years.
In an interview with Fox News, Patel claimed that political actors used unverified intelligence to trigger federal surveillance.
“It took me two years of my life to prove the following: that a political party in the United States of America in the 21st century would go overseas and hire some fake intelligence to produce fraudulent, false, unverified information,” Patel said.
He continued, “And then take the packaged lies they paid for with campaign funds and go to a secret surveillance court and illegally spy on your opponent to become President of the United States.
It refers to Trump’s long-standing accusations
Trump has repeatedly alleged that his 2016 Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton and former President Barack Obama were involved in orchestrating politically motivated surveillance of his campaign. Both Clinton and Obama have denied the allegations.
Patel’s remarks reignite long-standing disputes over the origins of the FBI’s Trump-Russia investigation and the use of Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrants.
Patel says the FISA warrants were later declared invalid
Patel reportedly told Fox News that the subpoenas approved by the FBI and signed by former FBI Director James Comey were eventually overturned by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
“The FISA court has come back and said these warrants are illegal,” Patel said.
He added: “The FBI failed to provide evidence of exculpatory evidence and innocence and that the FBI basically lied in these applications and all the information was unverified.”
Describing the situation as unprecedented, Patel said, “I don’t think this has ever happened before…Hollywood couldn’t have made it up.”
He claims he was personally watched
Patel also claimed that he himself was targeted during the investigation.
“I was illegally spied on by people like Rod Rosenstein and Chris Wray and 10 other staffers on the Hill and people who were elected to serve this country in the halls of Congress,” he said.
He accused former officials of continuing what he described as the “weaponization” of federal law enforcement.
Background on Patel and the ‘Nunes Memo’
Patel served on the National Security Council during Trump’s first term and later became deputy assistant to the president and senior director for counterterrorism.
He was also a key figure behind the 2018 “Nunes Memo,” a Republican-authored document alleging FBI bias and skepticism in the Trump-Russia investigation.
Patel promises further investigation
Patel argued that the alleged abuses at federal institutions continued after Trump left office in 2021 and intensified under President Joe Biden.
“In the four years that we’ve been out of office, I’ve known that they’ve continued to regenerate this institution of armaments,” Patel said.
He added: “So when I walked in the door I said, ‘We’ve only got a little bit. We’ve only got maybe half.'”
