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Kash Patel: “An agent in our field office in El Paso does not have the…”

Featuring: Kash Patel, Republican | Former Chief of Staff to the Acting U.S. Secretary of Defense | National

Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel

Published May 7, 2025 | Video Starts at 29:11

Modernizing and prioritizing the FBI is a critical component of what we need to do. Our capabilities and our infrastructure at the FBI are outdated. They have been the opposite of streamlined. An agent in our field office in El Paso does not have the same toolkit as an agent in our field offices covering the Dakotas as our agent in New York City. That's unacceptable to me. We will fix that. But building this new infrastructure is going to take not just a public effort. (29:11–29:17)

CLAIM

Asserts disparity in resources among FBI field offices.

This is an excerpt from a raw transcript. The assertions have not been audited or verified. Tap the video to view the source footage and understand the context.

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Kash Patel

“We executed over 450 search warrants and have rounded up in the last month alone over 400 individuals who choose to enact acts of violence…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 24:05-24:16
“Every seven minutes in this country as of last year, an individual, an American citizen, is killed from a drug overdose.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 26:36-26:44
“This time last year alone, 620kg of fentanyl had been seized. In these last three months, 840kg of fentanyl have been seized across the…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 31:34-31:46
“The known or suspected terrorist statistics in entering this country illegally last year was about 350.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:19:59-1:20:05
“Federal law enforcement officers arrested Milwaukee Circuit Court Judge Hannah Dugan on charges of the obstruction of an official…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:48:15-1:48:22
“President Trump has set some priorities out and a new focus for federal law enforcement.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 22:44-22:49
“We have apprehended three of the FBI's most top ten wanted fugitives in the world.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 23:04-23:09
“In Massachusetts alone, we have pre added 370 violent fugitives.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 23:20-23:24
“We seized along with our partners at DHS and the Department of Defense in one operation down off the coast of Florida, $44,000 of illicit…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 23:24-23:36
“As part of Operation Allied Corridor, We've targeted approximately 3,000 legal aliens with ties to criminal organizations who are eligible…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 23:42-23:51
“We have enacted along with our partners across the interagency in the Southwest Border Intelligence center. The Counter Cartel Coordination…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 26:44-26:54
“We are moving more than a thousand positions outside of the Washington D.C. area.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 27:46-27:46
“There are 904 positions that are currently slated for transfer from Washington, D.C. to field offices that are currently vacant.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 27:46-40:41
“We have found duplicative line item contracts already within the FBI.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 28:43-28:48
“We are letting our enemies and adversaries in mainland China produce chemicals and ship them here freely.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 31:55-32:02
“If we continue on the current trajectory outlined, we will have to not only eliminate 1100 vacancies currently at the FBI, I will have to…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 32:58-33:08
“The budgetary number I've asked for in my paperwork is, I think, reasonable. And also just to put it in perspective, it's multiples of…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 33:16-33:27
“In Kentucky alone, if we are allowed to continue on this trajectory, we will plus up with 30, approximately 30 agents and intel analysts…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 33:35-33:45
“Every Single State gets a plus up, Mr. Chairman. We have 55 field offices, a little over 300 resident agencies covering down and some large…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 34:39-34:51
“If that's what the law requires, yes. I'm not the appropriations expert, but if that's what the law requires, that's what we'll do.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 38:07-38:14
“We have careers running the entire Inspection Division and HRD component. That has not changed since I've been in the seat.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 39:44-39:52
“We have not addressed that specific email since I've arrived because the matter's in litigation in federal court.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 41:45-41:55
“The only way you get fired from the FBI while I'm the Director is if you violate the ethical guidelines or break the law.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 42:03-42:10
“Narcotics unfortunately are pouring in not just on a border state, but every single state has become a border state.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 43:11-43:17
“We stood up the SBIC just next door in Arizona, the Southwest Border Intelligence center.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 43:18-43:24
“We have already sent dozens of agents and analysts out there to countermand the entire narcotics flow and interdiction process at the…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 43:28-43:37
“We will, if the appropriations process allows, augment the number of agents and analysts in the field and SOS support staff by over 85.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 43:40-43:49
“The drone capabilities by our adversaries have significantly expanded their Technology is wildly impressive.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 45:24-45:31
“We are not sufficiently covering down on [drone technology] right now.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 45:49-45:51
“Critical infrastructure, especially in the Texas energy section, is increasingly under attack.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 45:53-45:59
“We can't do it from Washington D.C. we do it by engaging our state and local law enforcement partners.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 46:20-46:25
“We can't do the mission on those 2011 budget levels.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 48:20-48:25
“The budget request that we put in The FBI was 11.2 billion, I believe.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 49:40-49:46
“The proposed budget that I put forward is to cover us for $11.1 billion, which would not have us cut any positions.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 51:11-51:21
“The skinny budget is a proposal, and I'm working through the appropriations process to explain why we need more than what has been proposed.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 51:31-51:40
“We are moving agents, intel analysts and SOS across the country into every state to get a hand level grasp on violent crime in every single…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 54:13-54:24
“We have provided, on a large basis, unredacted documentation for every appropriate request we've received.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:00:08-1:00:14
“We'll continue to do that because it allows us to work with Congress directly to improve the process and make sure there are no warrantless…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:00:13-1:00:23
“The best cases I ever made as a terrorism prosecutor was on the task force because we had embedded state and local authorities with federal…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:08:19-1:08:33
“The gang Task force is, you know, right up there with the JTTF model.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:08:39-1:08:45
“We are not running the cases in the field. Agents are intel analysts are synthesizing intelligence, not me.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:08:58-1:09:04
“We're not doing it overnight. It's a process that's going to take about a year if we get it right across the board.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:09:30-1:09:37
“We're not taking out the headquarters footprint. We're leaving a large footprint here still.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:09:43-1:09:48
“Localized problems at the national level can't be comprehended by putting more people in Washington, D.C.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:11:15-1:11:32
“The FBI has, through budget cuts and CRS, left vacant 1,000 positions approximately every year.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:14:19-1:14:32
“While everybody thinks the FBI has 38,000 employees, we do, on the books. We don't have 38,000 humans.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:14:31-1:14:38
“It's approximately 35,000 [employees currently work for the FBI].”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:14:31-1:14:36
“The cut is only to one singular office, not to the OCDEF program writ large.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:16:13-1:16:20
“Yes, sir.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:17:41-1:17:43
“No, sir.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:17:52-1:17:54
“I would be forced to remove an additional 1300 employees if we go along with the budget that's out.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:18:04-1:18:13
“There was a 2%, and rightly so, pay raise.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:18:25-1:18:29
“A lot of the CCP processors of fentanyl precursors are no longer going to the narco traffickers down south.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:19:42-1:19:49
“We're on par right now with about known or suspected terrorists entering the country from the northern southern border. And it's about 45…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:20:09-1:20:16
“Approximately 37 positions to Missouri, 33 to Kansas City, one each to Topeka, Wichita, Jefferson City and two to Springfield.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:20:59-1:21:08
“We will most certainly be leaving the Hoover Building because it is simply unsafe for the FBI personnel.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:22:08-1:22:16
“There are people that violated their constitutional obligations and their duties to the American people, and they were rightly called out.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:26:07-1:26:14
“I'll do what I've always done and represent the American people, defend this country and make sure the Constitution is always upheld and the…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:28:27-1:28:36
“What I saw while I was there was the best example of what I've seen. When appropriators work with the Bureau to defend the nation.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:30:02-1:30:12
“It is our premier, premier experienced law enforcement capability center and training facility that the interagency only wishes they had.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:30:14-1:30:25
“And that's why we're moving 500 FBI employees this year to Huntsville, because the technical expertise they possess and we do not want to…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:30:54-1:31:05
“The FBI is nested in Huntsville and not Washington D.C.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:31:04-1:31:09
“We're going to need another 160 million to accomplish that [building new facilities in Huntsville].”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:32:17-1:32:31
“Once those buildings are built in the next three years, we will move another 13, maybe it's 1400 employees down to Huntsville.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:32:30-1:32:39
“I am asking the appropriators not only for the 145ish million dollars to finish the build, but the 60 million for the O and M to keep the…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:33:05-1:33:14
“Everyone that's qualified as a bomb technician in the FBI and the rest of the country gets that training at Huntsville, Alabama.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:34:16-1:34:23
“We actually partner wonderfully with NCMEC and we've committed to allowing our FBI employees to remain there no matter what.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:36:04-1:36:13
“That email was sent across government agencies.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:37:45-1:37:49
“It was sent to the FBI.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:37:54-1:37:56
“The information would have only been sent to their immediate supervisor. And every supervisor in the Bureau was told if they received any…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:38:27-1:38:37
“It came from the Department of Justice.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:38:49-1:38:52
“That should not have been transmitted anywhere. We got on top of it fast enough, where I believe.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:39:09-1:39:14
“Because the operational mandate that we have at the Bureau, in my opinion, prohibited the public disclosure of that information across our…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:39:17-1:39:28
“Well, the supervisors were told to stand down. What I'm trying to say is, when that email came in, we acted as fast as we could, I think the…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:40:01-1:40:30
“We never did that [FBI agents emailing the five things they've accomplished].”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:40:14-1:40:21
“And what we want to do is expand a little bit of footprint out there because we have so much land already paid for. And so yes, in my move…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:42:13-1:42:37
“Well, unlike, unlike Congressman Strong and Redstone, I don't have a prior appropriation that began new building construction in omb. So we…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:42:52-1:43:22
“Under the Biden Harris administration, we saw the FBI weaponized against conservative ideologies and more specifically, targeted former…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:45:26-1:45:34
“Corrupt actors within the FBI unfairly targeted [Donald Trump], beginning with illegal surveillance of his campaign and administration based…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:45:43-1:45:56
“Armed agents raided the home of pro life activist Mark Hauck, pointing weapons at his family over a peaceful Protestant.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:46:11-1:46:19
“Whistleblowers also revealed that the FBI's counterterrorism division labeled concerned parents as potential threats simply for opposing…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:46:18-1:46:22
“The President's budget request for FY2026 directly addresses some of these concerns, stating that the administration is committed to rooting…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:46:30-1:46:42
“In the last three months, [in Atlanta] 255 violent criminal offenders arrested, 72 kilograms of fentanyl taken off the street.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:47:37-1:47:46
“So called sanctuary cities where local authorities have publicly stated that they will not cooperate with federal immigration enforcement…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:49:23-1:49:31
“There has to be a colorblind system of justice. And we will execute the FBI's mandate of protecting the American people and upholding the…”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:50:03-1:50:13
“Extradited 29 Mexican National Cartel figures out of Mexico.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:52:57-1:53:02
“We're partnering with our intel community partners and ultimately with the Department of Defense.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:53:19-1:53:24
“Fentanyl is killing our children and our youth.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:53:36-1:53:40
“No one is looking at the precursor machines and factories in mainland China. We are.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:53:40-1:53:40
“What we need is an all of government approach to focus on the precursor shipping in mainland China.”
Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Hearing with FBI Director Kash Patel | Uploaded May 7, 2025 | 1:53:58-1:54:04