Kash Patel ordered FBI detail to give girlfriend's pal a lift home: sources [View all]

Source: NBC

FBI Director Kash Patel has — on more than one occasion — ordered that the security detail protecting his girlfriend escort one of her allegedly inebriated friends home after a night of partying in Nashville, according to three people with knowledge of the incidents.

Patel’s girlfriend, Alexis Wilkins, asked FBI agents on her security team at least two times, including once this spring, to drive her friend home, and agents objected to diverting from their assignment, said the sources, who were granted anonymity to discuss nonpublic matters. But Patel insisted they do as Wilkins requested and in one case called the leader of Wilkins’ security detail and yelled at him to do so.

News of the effort to deploy agents to provide security for a private citizen has spread through the bureau and beyond, as agents have grown increasingly concerned by Patel’s use of the bureau’s strapped resources, the people said. .....

At Patel’s direction, the FBI provides a separate security detail for Wilkins, 27, a country music performer who lives part time in Nashville for her work. The FBI security detail, first reported by MS NOW, is made up of members of an elite SWAT team based in the area. It has spurred concerns about Patel abusing FBI resources to essentially drive his girlfriend around for various events and appointments. The FBI has never before provided a separate security detail for a director’s girlfriend. Spouses of past directors typically received episodic security protection, but only when they were traveling with their spouse and the director’s detail.

Former FBI agents and senior law enforcement officials said it was already disturbing that Patel had pulled elite tactical agents away from their SWAT mission to drive his girlfriend around town. But they told MS NOW they were shocked that the director instructed tactical agents to use their time on yet another person the FBI had no reasonable duty to protect.

Read more: https://www.ms.now/news/kash-patel-girlfriend-fbi-detail-wilkins-ride-home