The Atlantic: FBI Director Kash Patel distributes personalized whiskey bottles to staff, civilians

0:03 THIS ONE IS ALSO ABOUT PATEL'S ALLEGED AFFINITY FOR BOOZE, SPECIFICALLY BOURBON.

0:07 ACCORDING TO CURRENT AND FORMER FBI EMPLOYEES,

0:10 PATEL TRAVELS WITH A SUPPLY OF PERSONALIZED BOURBON BRANDED JUST

0:14 FOR HIM THAT HE HANDS TO STAFF AND CIVILIANS ALIKE.

0:18 THAT IS THE BOTTLE RIGHT THERE.

0:22 WHEN ASKED BY FITZPATRICK,

0:23 THE FBI DID NOT DISPUTE THAT PATEL GIVES OUT BOTTLES OF WHISKEY.

0:28 THEY defended the practice as routine within the FBI.

0:31 For the record, we don't have any evidence that it is routine to stamp

0:35 bourbon bottles with the name of the FBI director and the department seal,

0:39 just like it's not routine to use the power of the Bureau

0:41 to aggressively pursue a reporter who

0:45 reports on unflattering or arguably dangerous conduct.

0:48 But Appell appears to be trying to make it routine, along with a whole lot else.

0:52 Joining us, MSNOW senior legal reporter Lisa Rubin,

0:55 MSNOW national security and intelligence analyst

0:58 and former FBI special agent in charge,

1:00 Michael Feinberg, and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, Elaine Kamark.

1:06 Let's start with these whiskey bottles, the bourbon.

1:08 Michael, is that routine?

1:11 Do you normally have an FBI

1:14 director with personalized bourbon handing out bottles?

1:18 You know, every now and then certain specialty teams like SWAT or BOM techs,

1:23 or for somebody's retirement, we'll get an engraved whiskey bottle.

1:29 It's more a gesture and a kindness than it is an invitation to get plastered.

1:37 But I've never in my entire career or in my reading about

1:43 the FBI history have ever come across a director who did this.

1:49 The FBI actually has had something since Louis Freeh's tenureship,

1:54 which is called the Bright Line Rule,

1:57 which manifestly forbids consumption or distribution

2:02 of alcohol on Bureau property, particularly during working hours.

2:07 So to say that Kash Patel is holding, I mean it's a pattern by now.

2:14 He is holding agents and the workforce to a standard

2:17 that he himself is not even trying to meet.

2:20 I hear your point about handing out

2:23 a bottle of whiskey for someone's retirement.

2:26 The reporting from the Atlantic and Fitzpatrick is that he's traveling around,

2:29 traveling around with boxes of this stuff branded

2:32 not for the department but under his name.

2:35 Yeah and there's a whole host of ethics rules

2:38 that used to be available online pertaining to the FBI.

2:43 If you're going to give something

2:46 as a gift to a partner or liaison relationship,

2:50 it's It's really supposed to be of de minimis value,

2:53 and it is not supposed to be out-of-bounds by DOJ or FBI policy.

2:59 It's been a while since I perused the guidelines,

3:01 but I'm quite sure carrying cases of bourbon

3:05 on a DOJ plane to earn favor with, say, an Olympic hockey team is not something

3:13 that was ever contemplated by the various ethics officials.

3:18 All right, let's talk more broadly about what this has meant for the FBI,

3:22 how DOJ has changed.

3:25 There's been a lot of talk from former agents like yourself but also former

3:29 senior level officials about how nothing is

3:32 familiar any longer and all sorts of red

3:35 lines have been crossed and the department is getting marred and trust is going

3:40 down and they're not as effective at the same time as they are investigating,

3:44 quote-unquote, enemies, making the department political.

3:46 Here is some video that was obtained by The New York

3:51 Times of Jack Smith at the Cosmos Club talking about DOJ.

4:00 We have a Department of Justice today.

4:02 It targets people for criminal prosecution

4:06 simply because the president doesn't like them.

4:11 We have a department that fails to investigate cases because they might

4:17 uncover facts that are inconvenient for narratives

4:19 the president would like to press.

4:25 Is that fair from the former special counsel?

4:28 By the way, Elaine, those remarks were made last month

4:30 in a private discussion at the Cosmos Club there in Washington.

4:34 So is that a fair assessment from the former special counsel,

4:37 who himself has been hauled in front of Congress?

4:40 Well, he may have an axe to grind, but that doesn't mean it's unfair.

4:44 The fact of the matter is that this is a very politicized Justice I MEAN,

4:49 THE FACT THAT THEY'RE GOING AFTER A REPORTER

4:52 AND THAT KASH PATEL IS CLAIMING DEFAMATION, AS WE ALL KNOW, THE BAR IS VERY HIGH

4:58 FOR DEFAMATION FOR SOMEBODY WHO'S IN A MAJOR political office.

5:02 And the courts have been very,

5:04 very careful about defending freedom of the press.

5:07 And so I suspect that this lawsuit will go nowhere.

5:10 And it's just more of the same in the Trump PUTTING YOUR NAME ON EVERYTHING,

5:17 BRANDING EVERYTHING, TRYING TO BULLDOZE YOUR WAY TO GET YOUR WAY.

5:21 IT'S NOT A SURPRISE.

5:23 SO THEY'RE GOING AFTER,

5:24 HE'S TALKING ABOUT HOW THEY'RE going after political enemies.

5:27 That's going on as we speak.

5:29 We've been following a number of high-profile cases.

5:33 One of them is Mark Kelly, the senator.

5:36 What happened with Mark Kelly today in court?

5:38 Well, it looks as if the D .C.

5:39 Circuit is going to uphold a prior ruling that found that the decision to strip

5:44 Mark Kelly of certain titles and statuses

5:47 associated with his military service was not lawful.

5:50 That's not a surprise to anybody who understands the law surrounding that.

5:55 But the fact that the administration continues to press

5:58 that case and that it will continue to defend that decision,

6:02 even as Mark Kelly is a sitting U .S.

6:05 senator, it's in court.

6:20 We've also seen the Southern Poverty

6:22 Law Center being arraigned on an indictment.

6:25 We're also seeing continued conversations about

6:28 other people in the political domain who remain under investigation and perhaps

6:33 may be under prosecution at some point.

6:35 Jim Comey was supposed to show up in court early next week

6:39 for an arraignment on his new indictment in the Eastern District of New York.

6:43 That's been called off, but it doesn't change the fact that Jim

6:47 Comey is now defending a second indictment

6:49 and is rumored to be the subject of an investigation in other cases as well.

6:52 Yeah, I mean, this segment might feel

6:53 unruly because there's just so much going on.

6:56 I mean, you have Mark Kelly at the Southern Poverty Law Center.

6:58 You have Kash Patel and his bourbon.

7:00 You also have an update on what

7:02 happened in Georgia regarding Fulton County voting records.

7:07 The county sued to get all of those records back, and a judge has done what?

7:12 Judge denied it.

7:13 Now, rule 41G motions, which are motions in a criminal case

7:16 to retrieve property that is seized by the government,

7:20 they very, very rarely succeed.

7:22 But as someone affiliated with the Brendan Center told the New York Times if

7:26 there were ever a reason for a rule 41G motion to succeed, this was it.

7:30 Why?

7:31 Because search warrants have to be predicated

7:33 on probable cause to investigate a crime.

7:36 And here, any crime that the government said that it was investigating,

7:39 the statutes of limitation have long since

7:42 expired and no one is contesting that.

7:44 So why it is that the judge allowed the government to remain

7:48 in possession of these materials seized from THE FULTON COUNTY CLERK'S OFFICE

7:53 IS GOING TO BE AN ISSUE THAT I THINK WILL END UP

7:54 ON APPEAL AND PERHAPS ALL THE WAY UP TO THE SUPREME COURT.

7:59 SO I GUESS THE SABOTAGE THEME ACTUALLY WORKS REALLY

8:01 WELL HERE WE ARE TALKING ABOUT DISRUPTION AND CHAOS,

8:03 WE ARE SEEING SO MUCH OF THAT, SO MUCH SO THAT THE DOJ ITSELF,

8:07 ELANE, IS HAVING A HARD TIME HIRING.

8:10 BLOOMBERG LAW FIRST REPORTED THAT DOJ IS

8:12 OFFERING SIGNING BONUSES OF $25 ,000 FOR LAWYERS

8:16 HIRED IN OFFICES THAT ARE INVESTIGATING YOUTH TRANSGENDER

8:20 TREATMENTS AND LITIGATING THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION'S IMMIGRATION AGENDA.

8:25 THEY'RE ACTIVELY LOOKING FOR PEOPLE WHO WILL DO THEIR BIDDING

8:28 AND IT SEEMS LIKE THEY'RE NOT HAVING AN EASY TIME FINDING THEM.

8:31 YEAH, THAT'S RIGHT BECAUSE MOST LAWYERS GO TO LAW SCHOOL AND ACTUALLY

8:36 BELIEVE IN FOLLOWING THE LAW AND CLEARLY THIS ADMINISTRATION DOESN'T AND LOOK,

8:41 ALL THESE LAWSUITS ARE POLITICAL THEATER.

8:44 THEY KNOW THEY'RE NOT GOING TO WIN THEM.

8:46 THEY KNOW THEY'RE GOING TO GET REVERSED DOWN THE LINE ON SOME APPEAL.

8:49 THEY'RE LUCKY IF THEY WIN A PORTION OF THEM.

8:51 THESE ARE POLITICS.

8:53 THESE ARE TO TRY TO GET THEIR ENEMIES, TRY TO DISCOMBOBILATE THEM,

8:58 TRY TO SCARE PEOPLE AWAY FROM ATTACKING

9:00 THE PRESIDENT OR ATTACKING ONE OF HIS CABINET SECRETARIES.

9:05 THIS IS ALL ABOUT POLITICS.

9:06 IT'S NOT ABOUT ACTUALLY TRYING TO WIN CASES BECAUSE

9:10 INEVITABLY THE CASES THAT THEY ARE PURSUING, THEY LOSE.

9:14 REMEMBER THAT WHEN THE PRESIDENT TRIED TO LITIGATE HIS 2020 ELECTION,

9:20 THERE WERE 62 CASES BROUGHT.

9:23 HE LOST 61 OF THEM.

9:24 THIS IS NOT ABOUT WINNING THE CASES.

9:28 THIS IS ALL ABOUT CREATING A POLITICAL ATMOSPHERE OF FEAR,

9:33 INTIMIDATION AND GIVING HIS SUPPORTERS A REASON TO SAY

9:37 WE'RE STILL WITH CREATING A POLITICAL ATMOSPHERE OF FEAR,

9:39 BECAUSE YOU SAY 62 CASES, 61 WERE DISMISSED OR HE LOST,

9:44 WHAT HAPPENED TO THAT ONE OTHER THE ELECTION WAS IN PENNSYLVANIA.

9:49 HE DID WIN THAT CASE, BUT IT DID NOT OVERTURN THE ELECTION.

9:54 IT DID NOT OVERTURN THE IT DIDN'T

9:56 RESULT IN ELECTION RESULTS It didn't change anything.

9:59 So, Michael, there's, as we've been reporting,

10:01 trouble at DOJ, obviously, in hiring lawyers.

10:04 How has the FBI been functioning under Kash Patel?

10:09 How do regular agents feel?

10:11 Have they been enthusiastic about his leadership, or is there a divide?

10:15 Help me understand.

10:18 It is difficult to fully articulate the depth

10:22 of contempt for Kash Patel that most FBI agents feel.

10:28 I do not know a single agent who, like me, left,

10:35 or do I have any friends whatsoever still in the Bureau

10:39 who have a single positive thing to say about his stewardship?

10:45 You know, nobody agrees with every director's, every decision.

10:52 I was there for Mueller, for Comey, for Ray, and for a brief time for Patel.

11:00 And the difference is with the first three,

11:03 you might have disagreed with their decision or their policies,

11:09 but you had respect for their intellectual credentials.

11:13 You had respect for their professional achievements.

11:17 You had respect for their temperaments and their character, their integrity.

11:23 Patel brings no intellectual credentials to the job.

11:27 He has no relevant experiences whatsoever that would

11:32 have enabled him to do this well,

11:35 and as near as we can tell, he has no integrity.

11:39 So it's unclear what anybody would look up to.

11:44 I have never seen morale in any organization

11:47 as low as it is in the FBI right now.