Trump Fake News “Enemy of the People” FBI Director Patel “Prosecutes Media Conspirators”
President-elect Trump designated fake news as the “enemy of the people” during the election and appointed Patel, a lawyer who has vowed to “prosecute media conspirators,” as the new director on the 30th, while leaving the FBI director with the remaining term.
Cathy Patel, who served as acting secretary of defense and chief of staff during Trump’s first term, appeared on the podcast “Rumble” hosted by former Trump strategist Stephen K. Bannon and discussed the possibility of Trump’s second term starting in 2025, saying, “We are going to find conspirators not only in the government but also in the media.”
Patel continued, “Yes, we are going to go after the people in the media who lied to the American people, who helped Joe Biden rig the presidential election. We will find out, whether it’s criminal or civil. We will actually use the Constitution to prosecute them for crimes that they have always said we were guilty of but never committed.”
Trump wrote on TruthSocial on September 25, “THE ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE! The Fake News Media should pay a big price for what they have done to our once great Country! "They are a real threat to democracy, and in fact, the enemy of the people! The Fake News Media should pay a big price for what they have done to our once great Country!" Regarding Patel’s nomination, the New York Times reported on the 31st, “He was a relatively unknown Capitol Hill staffer at the beginning of the Trump administration in 2017, but became an aggressive defender of the former president against the investigation into whether his 2016 campaign colluded with Russians to influence the outcome of the election, and over the next four years, he emerged as one of Trump’s most trusted aides and one of the most powerful national security officials in the federal government.” “By the end of his term in 2020, Trump trusted Patel enough to ask her to be the deputy director of the CIA or FBI, a plan he scrapped only after senior officials, including former CIA Director Gina Haspel and former Attorney General William P. Barr, vehemently opposed the move.” The last attorney general of the Trump administration wrote in his memoir that he told then-chief of staff Mark Meadows that Patel's appointment as FBI deputy director would be "only on my dead body."
After leaving the government after the end of the Trump administration, Patel used his reputation as a Trump insider to sell the children's book "Kash" merchandise on his online store.
He wrote a children's book about the Russian investigation into "King Donald" being persecuted by the evil "Hillary Quinton," and the story of the book's main character, "King Donald," and a wizard named "Kash" who exposes a conspiracy to bring him down.
President Trump declared about Patel's children's book, "I want this amazing book in every school in America."
Trump's close relationship with Patel is entangled in a "media lawsuit."
On December 12, 2020, Fox News reported that "Acting Chief of Staff to the Secretary of Defense Kathy Patel, Sued CNN for $50 Million Under the title, “Cassie Patel, Acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller’s chief of staff, has filed a $50 million defamation lawsuit against CNN and several of its top reporters,” the article reported, “The complaint, filed in Virginia Circuit Court, names CNN reporters Barbara Starr, Zachary Cohen, Ryan Browne, Alex Marquardt and Nicole Gaouette as defendants, and alleges that CNN “intentionally or recklessly conveyed a false message” in an attempt to sensationalize the “news” and humiliate Patel.” Fox News continued, “Critics say liberal media ‘blocked’ Hunter Biden coverage until after the election in an effort to defeat Trump,” and “According to the complaint, Patel, a top aide to Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) and a former Trump adviser, alleged that CNN “covered” her from November 24 to December 24, 2019.” The defendants published a series of articles on the 4th, which they claimed contained "a series of false and defamatory statements" about them, the Times said.
The accused New York Times said, "Patel has filed defamation lawsuits against the New York Times, CNN, and Politico," and "since leaving government, he has founded a fundraising group to "fight the deep state" and fund lawsuits on behalf of "ordinary Americans" who he says have been "defamed" by what he calls the "fake news mafia." The Times continued, "Minister Patel's threats to the press echo President Trump's own warnings," and "Former President Trump said on Truth Social in September, "I candidly, publicly and proudly say that if I am elected President of the United States, they and other LameStream Media companies will be thoroughly investigated for their deliberately dishonest and corrupt reporting of people, things and events." "Why should NBC or any other corrupt and dishonest media company have the right to use America's most valuable airwaves for free? NBC News, and especially Comcast, with their one-sided and malicious reporting on MSNBC, should be investigated for 'treason that threatens our country. '" In a video posted to his campaign website earlier this year, President-elect Trump pledged that during his term he would “return the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which regulates broadcast licenses, to the authority of the President as required by the Constitution.” Patel’s nomination has closely aligned with Trump’s belief that much of the nation’s law enforcement and national security apparatus should be debiased and held accountable for the unfair investigations and prosecutions of President Trump and his allies. Patel, a favorite among Trump’s political base, has served as a federal prosecutor and public defender, but has little law enforcement or management experience, typical of FBI directors, and only a brief stint in public service at the end of his term. Trump announced his election in a social media post, saying, “As a senior adviser, Patel has played a pivotal role in exposing Russia, Russia, Russia’s hoax while upholding truth, accountability, and the Constitution.” President-elect Trump announced on the 30th that he would like to replace FBI Director Christopher A. Wray with Kash Patel, a vocal critic of the FBI who has called for the closure of the FBI’s Washington headquarters, the firing of its leadership, and the “subjugation” of American law enforcement.
The announcement formalizes Trump’s strong dislike of Wray, who was appointed to the position by Trump’s first term and whose ten-year term expires in 2027.
Trump appointed Wray to the position, but fired him within months, and called Wray shortly after Trump’s defeat in the 2020 presidential election to tell him that he would not fire him even when he was about to fire other high-ranking officials, such as Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper, the New York Times reported, in a “complicated internal relationship.” Regarding the inside story of the attempted public dismissal by abruptly announcing a successor during his term, the New York Times reported that “former President Trump, whose anger toward the FBI deepened after the FBI executed a search warrant on his Florida club and Mar-a-Lago home in August 2022 to find classified documents, suggested Director Wray’s resignation early this year,” and “President Trump declared that he wanted a new director long before he took office, and pressured Wray to resign before he was fired.” The incident that triggered the search and seizure was an incident in which Patel said in an interview with conservative media outlet Breitbart News in 2022 that “I was present when former President Trump declassified documents before leaving office,” and “President Trump’s office issued a standing order immediately after the search and seizure of the club that any material that he, as president, left the Oval Office and went to the White House residence was considered declassified.” The interview caught the attention of federal investigators, who subpoenaed the remaining confidential documents in May 2022, and three months later, the FBI executed a search warrant at Trump’s Palm Beach club, Mar-a-Lago, to find additional classified material.
Trump has been obsessed with public relations and keeping his name in the headlines since the 1980s under Republican Reagan, but his “aggression toward the press” has grown since his 2015 presidential campaign began, as threats against the press have grown more vehement.
“He has talked about reforming libel laws to make it easier to sue reporters for their reporting,” the Times said. “He has repeatedly antagonized the press by swarming the crowds at his rallies, and as soon as he took office, he began publicly calling the press “the enemy of the people,” using language often used by dictators around the world to justify their crackdowns on the press.” “He was obsessed with leaks,” the Times reported. “He wanted aides to intervene in the merger of AT&T and CNN, CNN kept him tightly guarded, and he told aides that officials wanted to obtain the phone records of reporters covering him, a request that was never met.”