FBI Director Kash Patel has been busted carrying a cheat sheet of attack lines for his grilling in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Patel, 46, printed out attack lines against Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, a ranking member on the committee—including suggestions that the senator and his wife are directly profiting from his time in Congress.
Patel’s bullet list, whose first page was titled “DURBIN INFO” and includes bolded and red text, calls out Durbin’s wealth. The list claims that it has “increased 364% since 1997.”
Two lines below that, Patel’s cheat sheet reads, “Wife has lobbying conflicts. Wife’s clients (Eastern Illinois University and the City of Naperville) collected over $1 million in federal earmarks prompted by Durbin.”
More pages follow the Durbin cheat sheet, but photographers did not capture what they say or who they target.
Patel’s appearance is part of an annual oversight hearing on the FBI. Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal, of Connecticut, pressed Patel for his thoughts on a bombshell report that revealed a top ally of Vladimir Putin—who is actively being sanctioned by the United States—paid for and attended Don Jr.’s wedding weekend in the Bahamas.
“I would like to know what steps you are taking to investigate,” Blumenthal asked Patel.
The FBI director dodged the question, claiming he had no knowledge of the ProPublica report, which was arguably the biggest news story in the country on Monday.
“I’m not sure what public reporting you are referring to,” he said. “The only thing I can tell you is that the counterespionage arrests by this FBI are up 53 percent, including from Russia.”
In another contentious exchange, Patel admitted that the FBI will be present at polling stations in November.
“We have an election crimes community coordinator in all 56 field offices, so you bet we’re going to have them there and manning the polls for election interference matters,” he told Democratic Sen. Peter Welch.
Patel then talked over Welch’s attempts to get another question in, seemingly reading from a list of talking points.
“This FBI is not going to shy away from that effort,” he said. “And if you want to continue lying about the men and women of the FBI, so you can have your four-second campaign ad, go ahead. But the historic results: the 20% reduction in murder rate, the 1,100 terrorist attacks stopped, the 11,000 children found, the 54,000 violent offenders are what this FBI is driving towards. The top 10 most captured, six of the most wanted fraudsters captured.”
As Welch pushed further, Patel pulled out another line from his cheat sheet.
“Are you done with your campaign ad?” he asked, dodging a question. “By the way, I want to know how your wealth increased 4,000% since you became a United States senator.”
