When faced with published reports calling you “an out-of-control drinker,” said Annabella Rosciglione in the Daily Beast, it’s best not to hand out “personalized, branded bottles of bourbon.”
Journalist Sarah Fitzpatrick two weeks ago followed up her recent article in The Atlantic on FBI Director Kash Patel’s reported binge drinking—which triggered him to file a $250 million defamation lawsuit—with a “bombshell” new revelation that he travels with bourbon bottles engraved with “Ka$h Patel” and an FBI badge. According to the article, Patel has distributed this “boozy merch” at such venues as the Milan Winter Olympics and an FBI training seminar taught by Ultimate Fighting Championship athletes. When one bottle mysteriously disappeared from the training seminar, a panicky Patel seemed to “lose his mind” and threatened to polygraph-test his staff to find the culprit. An FBI spokesman claimed that it’s common practice for directors to hand out gifts. But the bureau actually frowns on agents drinking, and when Fitzpatrick asked a former longtime official whether directors commonly handed out liquor, “he burst out laughing.”
Patel is again looking to punish The Atlantic journalist for her “deeply unflattering account,” said Ken Dilanian and Carol Leonnig in MS.now. Two insiders claim the FBI launched a criminal investigation of Fitzpatrick to find her sources—even though there’s no national security justification. Agency spokesman Ben Williamson denied Fitzpatrick is under investigation. But Patel has reportedly entered panic mode about his job. He has good reason for fear, said Nellie Bowles in The Free Press. President Trump is famously a teetotaler, and he may be running out of patience for a hard-partying subordinate who “seems to be taking his cues for the job from Bond movies and frat houses.”
The “frat boy” is likely safe for now, said Nick Catoggio in The Dispatch. The public seems largely indifferent to reports of gross mismanagement and chaos at the FBI, negating the need for a fall guy. And Patel has dutifully used the FBI to investigate the 2020 election and Trump’s enemies, producing “embarrassingly flimsy indictments” that prove only that he’s loyal. Patel embodies MAGA populism, proving that an “unfit, unprofessional, embarrassing yutz” is no improvement on his “deep state” predecessors. If and when Trump does finally fire this incompetent “chud” over an even greater embarrassment, it will “feel like a verdict on this entire administration.”