FBI Director Kash Patel clashes with senator over report of his excessive drinking

FBI Director Kash Patel angrily lashed out at a Democratic lawmaker at a budget hearing Tuesday, calling allegations that he drinks excessively on the job and that staff have found him unreachable at times “unequivocally, categorically false.”

“I will not be tarnished by baseless allegations,” Patel told Sen. Chris Van Hollen when the Maryland Democrat confronted him about a recent article in The Atlantic magazine that painted an unflattering portrait of his leadership of the nation’s premier federal law enforcement agency.

“These reports about your conduct, including reports of your being so drunk and hungover that your staff had to force entry into your home are extremely alarming,” Van Hollen said to Patel. “If true, they demonstrate a gross dereliction of your duty and a betrayal of public trust.”

Patel denied the reporting is accurate. He has launched a defamation lawsuit against the publication over the story.

The Atlantic has said it stands by its reporting and would vigorously defend against the “meritless lawsuit.”

Patel shouted over Van Hollen and sought to turn the tables by accusing him of “slinging margaritas” in El Salvador, a reference to a visit the Democrat paid last year to Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was jailed there following his arrest and wrongful deportation amid U.S. President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.

“The only person who has been drinking during the day on the taxpayer dime was you,” Patel said.

“Director Patel, come on,” Van Hollen said. “These are serious allegations that were made against you.”

The senator also called Patel’s claims that he had run up an expensive bar tab in El Salvador “provably false.”

After last year’s meeting, Van Hollen publicly accused El Salvador’s government of having misrepresented the nature of his encounter with Abrego Garcia, saying officials there had staged the meeting with drinks appearing to be alcohol and angled to set the meeting by a hotel pool.

The testy exchange occurred at an annual Senate committee budget hearing featuring Patel and other senior law enforcement leaders.

Patel eventually said he would take a test about his alcohol consumption. He committed to taking the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT), as long as the senator took it, too, he said, “side by side.”

FBI Director Kash Patel grilled about drinking, spending by committee 

FBI Director Kash Patel faced questions about his leadership during a congressional committee following a series of allegations of excessive drinking, poor job performance and improper use of resources.

Patel touts crime-fighting achievements

The director used the forum to tout what he described as major crime-fighting achievements since he took the position and received a friendly reception from Republican senators who praised his leadership.

Democrats, by contrast, pressed Patel on headline-generating travel that has blended personal leisure with his duties — including a trip to the Winter Olympics in Italy, where he partied with the U.S. men’s hockey team after their gold medal win — as well as the mass terminations under his watch of agents who worked on investigations into Trump.

U.S. senator calls FBI director ‘a disgrace’ 

Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen called FBI Director Kash Patel ‘a disgrace’ during a committee hearing in Washington when Patel refused to answer a question about whether he’s aware lying to Congress is a crime.

“You attended the Olympics in Milan,” said Sen. Chris Coons, a Delaware Democrat. “How much did your trip cost and to what extent did that help you carry out your mission as director of the FBI?”

Patel responded that the FBI was responsible for security at the Olympics and asserted that his trip to Italy helped facilitate the transfer into U.S. custody of a Chinese cyber criminal who’d been detained by Italian authorities.

In a later exchange, the FBI director refused to answer Van Hollen, who repeatedly asked Patel whether he was aware that lying to Congress is a crime.

Patel said that he had not perjured himself during his testimony. — The Associated Press