'COME ON, BRO'

Why ‘SNL’ Alum Is Going All-In on Trump’s ‘Stupidest’ Goon

The stand-up comedian isn’t angry; he’s disappointed.

Comedian Nimesh Patel is shocked that FBI director Kash Patel still has a job.

“Come on, bro,” the former Saturday Night Live writer, 40, said about Kash, 46, on Obsessed: The Podcast. “You could be so much better than you are. But you’re not.”

Patel dedicates part of his Sept. Netflix stand-up special, Buy the Dip, to slamming the unhinged FBI director who shares his last name. Patel was the first Indian writer on SNL, which he joined for one season in 2018. He earned an Emmy nomination for his work on the show. Patel also wrote jokes for Hasan Minhaj, 40, for the 2017 White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner and has worked closely with Chris Rock, 61. Buy the Dip is his debut Netflix special.

In Buy the Dip, Patel says, “Kashyap Pramod Vinod Patel is the first Indian director of the FBI, and that means something. It means he’s also the last Indian director of the FBI.”

Patel was the “first and last Indian writer on SNL,” he told Obsessed, so he can “relate to the pressures of being the first” that Kash must experience. Even so, Kash’s incompetence “blows my mind,” he said.

Though he’s surprised about Kash’s relative longevity, Patel has a theory about why President Donald Trump, 80, has let him stay. Amid the revolving door of hiring and firing in Trump’s administration, Kash seems like a bizarre choice for a Trump-appointed mainstay. But it might make more sense upon closer examination, Patel said.

“I don’t even think Donnie is paying attention to what the FBI is doing,” he said. “You know, the conspiracy theory being like, ‘If your enemy [from] before you became president is the FBI, put the stupidest person you know in charge of the FBI. And just see what happens.”

If that was the plan, it seems to be working, Patel added.

“Obviously, it’s weird,” he said. The FBI isn’t “coming after” Trump in the same way that former directors might have.

In Buy the Dip, Patel veers from slamming Kash’s politics to belittling his height. Patel jokes that Kash is “too short to lead the FBI.”

“You can’t be 5′7″ and in charge of finding missing people,” Patel said. “How about you find the rest of yourself first, huh?”

Patel knows the FBI might target him after hearing his jokes, but he thinks it’s unlikely. He added that “it’s a non-zero thought” that one day he’ll arrive at the airport and “it’s going to be like, ‘You’re not allowed to fly anywhere,’ and that’s going to be a real problem,” he said.

“It would be a huge waste of resources,” Patel continued. “But they’re known to waste resources on other things.”

Ultimately, though, he thinks Kash’s potential retaliation would amuse him - especially if Netflix, rather than Patel himself, was the target.

“Most jokes have a nugget of truth in them,” Patel said. “If it wasn’t this administration, I wouldn’t be concerned, but he sued The Atlantic. He sued the Times, from what I understand. If Netflix got sued, it would be pretty funny to me. I wouldn’t mind it. I think I would find it pretty entertaining.”

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Dana Herrnstadt Editorial Intern, Obsessed

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