Trump Nominee Kash Patel Has a Little List, Does Poilievre?

December 14, 2024 , Brooke Jeffrey , Comments Off on Trump Nominee Kash Patel Has a Little List, Does Poilievre?

So much for my decision to ignore events south of the border for a while. Just when it seemed that things could hardly get any worse, at least in terms of president-elect Trump’s various picks for cabinet and other posts, we have the spectacle of Kash Patel. After covering nominees like Pete Hegseth, Robert F Kennedy Jr and Tulsi Gabbard, one may well ask why Patel merits yet another piece. Sadly, there are all too many reasons.

First, Patel –Trump’s choice to run the FBI — is a man who hates the FBI. Patel even tried to sue its current director, Christopher Wray, before being “laughed out of court”.[i] Then there is the minor detail that, unlike cabinet posts, which automatically open up with an incoming president, this job was not even vacant. But that failed to stop Trump. Unfortunately, it seems that Director Wray decided resistance was futile. Although he himself was appointed by Trump, and had three years left to serve on a ten-year appointment, Wray unexpectedly announced yesterday that he would be resigning on the last day of the Biden administration, leaving the way clear for Patel’s nomination.

As if that were not bad enough, we now have several credible reports coming out of Washington that Patel has done what should have been impossible. Being nominated is one thing. But as Matt Gaetz, Trump’s failed Attorney General nominee, learned, getting confirmed by the Senate is quite another matter. With the withdrawal of Gaetz’ candidacy It began to seem as if some Republican senators had limits and Trump could only push so far. But no. Having launched a concerted proactive charm offensive last week, it appears that Patel – unlike the hapless Gaetz — has managed to round up sufficient support in the Senate to breeze through his confirmation process.[ii] If these reports are accurate, and his supporters stand firm in the face of what are sure to be increased attacks on Patel’s lack of fitness for office, a man who is dangerously unhinged is about to take control of America’s premier law enforcement agency.

One reason why Patel’s candidacy may succeed, where other nominees will likely face a much rougher ride, is that almost all Republicans seem to share his view that the FBI is corrupt, partisan and elitist. This negative take on an agency that was once solidly supported by Republicans has only developed recently, since Trump captured the GOP. This sea change, in turn, is primarily because of a series of FBI/Justice investigations that targeted Trump and some of his closest advisers, making it a highly personal vendetta for Trump. Some of these include:

(1) the Russian ties of the Trump campaign’s leaders, including his son Donald Jr, during the 2016 election

(2) the prosecution/conviction of Trump inner circle members Michael Flynn, Steve Bannon and Peter Navarro, (whom Trump has promised to re-appoint as his trade commissioner), and

(3) the raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Largo residence to seize a massive quantity of classified documents relating to national security that Trump had denied were in his possession. And, finally,

(4) what Republicans perceive to be the FBI’s refusal on partisan grounds to “properly investigate” the activities of President Biden’s son, Hunter Biden.

This negative view of the FBI was underlined by the incoming chair of the Senate’s Judiciary Committee, Senator Charles Grassley, (Iowa), who accused the Bureau of “perpetrating some of the most egregious, Orwellian conduct I’ve witnessed in my nearly 50 years in Congress.” [iii] He was joined in his criticism by fellow Senator Joni Ernst, who declared after meeting Patel this week that he would bring “much-needed transparency” to the FBI.[iv]

Patel himself has had quite the career path. Even among members of Trump’s inner circle he has often been persona non grata. Former Attorney General William Barr threatened to resign if Trump appointed Patel as his deputy. Patel’s former boss, Secretary of Defence Mark Esper, tried unsuccessfully to fire him. Another former boss, National Security Council Chair John Bolton, also resisted hiring Patel but finally gave in to Trump’s persistent pleas, apparently to his regret.[v]

So what exactly has Patel said he would do if he were to take over the FBI? In his book Government Gangsters: The Deep State, the Truth and the Battle for Our Democracy, published in 2023, he proposed moving the FBI headquarters out of Washington “to prevent institutional capture and curb FBI leadership from engaging in political gamesmanship.” [vi] That somewhat modest shot across the bow was soon followed by far more aggressive ideas. Many amounted to a major dismantling of the agency. In one interview on his book ‘tour’ he demonstrated a complete lack of understanding of Bureau activities when he declared, “I’d shut down the FBI Hoover Building on day one and reopen it the next day as a museum of the ‘deep state.’ Then, I’d take the 7,000 employees that work in that building and send them across America to chase down criminals. Go be cops. You’re cops — go be cops.”[vii] In another interview he made it clear that all the top echelons of the Bureau would be dismissed, but it was unclear whether anyone at all would replace them.

Outrageous as these examples of Patel’s views and plans may be, they are not the impetus for this piece. Instead, Patel’s most egregious offence, the one which has earned him a separate diatribe in this space, is his so-called ‘enemies list’. Patel chooses to refer to the 60 individuals he specifically identifies in Government Gangsters as “Members of the Executive Branch Deep State” whom he describes as “a cabal of unelected tyrants” and “the most dangerous threat to our democracy.” [viii] Hard to see what else it could be but an enemies list, especially since he told Steve Bannon in one recent interview “We will go out and find these conspirators, not just in government, but in the media. We are coming after you.”[ix]

But even here he is demonstrating a cavalier approach to his understanding of government, since along with senior bureaucrats, military leaders and media personalities he targets at least five individuals who WERE elected, including senators, a president and two vice presidents. He also identifies all three of his former bosses and several other Republican ‘traitors’. And he has stressed that not only criminal charges but harassment by the IRS and civil suits are on the table, depending on the target. Nor is that list of 60 the end of it. Patel has made it clear more will be added as his work progresses.

With this type of attitude, is it any wonder that President Joe Biden pardoned his son and is giving serious thought to pre-emptive pardons for anyone on Patel’s list, even though they have done nothing wrong? And is it any wonder that many of Patel’s targets have found themselves between a rock and a hard place, on the one hand vigorously rejecting the idea of a pre-emptive pardon for themselves precisely because it would make them look guilty of something, and on the other worrying about the impact of such a witch hunt on their lives and careers, to say nothing of their families.

It must be noted that the concept of an enemies list is not unprecedented in American politics, but the other occasion when it became an issue is hardly one that most Americans would care to repeat. Some readers may be old enough to recall that the Watergate hearings revealed the thoroughly disgraced former president Richard Nixon once had an enemies list. But they will also recall that no one but Nixon and two of his aides took it seriously. Indeed, no one thought Nixon was mentally stable at the time. And this list was of people the president “disliked,” from all walks of life, including many famous Hollywood actors. Moreover a tentative scheme by one of the aides, John Colson, to have the IRS audit some of these people was flatly rejected by the IRS Commissioner of the day. [x]

Perhaps aware of that potential roadblock, Donald Trump has already named his choice to be the next IRS Commissioner, even though that post is also occupied at the moment. Daniel Werfel’s term does not expire until 2027, but it is possible for the new president to fire him. However Trump will incur substantial costs in the form of a severance package unless he is able to prove (highly unlikely) that the dismissal is for cause. Equally concerning is the president-elect’s choice of replacement. Former Congressman Billy Long of Missouri, an ardent Trump supporter, became a tax adviser for a number of questionable small business tax avoidance schemes after his defeat in 2022. Otherwise Long lacks any obvious qualifications for the job. Originally an auctioneer, he never served on the Finance or Tax Writing committees during his six terms in office. The current chair of the Senate Finance committee, Democrat Ron Wyden, has described Long’s selection as “bizarre.”[xi]

At the very least it would seem that Patel’s concept of an enemies list is one more step on America’s current trajectory of decline to illiberal democracy. But it is more than that. It is symptomatic of a mindset which not only devalues democratic norms and practices, but actively pursues an agenda based on vengeance and retribution. The consequences for civil society and the possibility of future peaceful transitions decreases dramatically if this line of attack is allowed to continue.

Nor is it a mindset unique to the Trump MAGA crowd of populists and near anarchists. Canadians should recall that former prime minister Stephen Harper had an Enemies List. Its existence was revealed by disgruntled Conservative ministerial staffers who received a memo from Harper’s PMO telling them to prepare ‘blacklists’ for their ministers. Among the suggested targets were environmental groups, non profits, civic and industry associations that had “different views from that of the government.” [xii] The aides were outraged at the idea that they should classify stakeholders and bureaucrats as friends or foes, and wrote an open letter to the media in which they declared, “As Canadians we are appalled by the paranoia which this request demonstrates.” The aides were immediately classed as “politically unreliable” by PMO and cut out of the decision-making loop. Several resigned.[xiii] Former Harper minister Peter Kent not only joined in the criticism, but went much further. Recalling the Watergate scandal in the US, Kent said “An enemies list was the very nomenclature used by Nixon. His political horizon was divided very starkly into them and us.” [xiv]

That was then and this is now. Despite examples of this same mindset, recent Alberta premiers Jason Kenney (who spent hundreds of thousands of taxpayers’ dollars on an “Energy War Room” to counteract “enemies” of the province’s oil and gas industry) and Danielle Smith ( who has often referred to a “deranged vendetta” against Albertans by environmentalists and the federal government) both managed to be elected handily. The discourse of federal Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre, a quintessential populist and opportunist, reveals an even more disquieting list of perceived enemies, from the anonymous “elites,” “gatekeepers” and mysterious “global elites” to specific individuals such as the Governor of the Bank of Canada or the president of the CBC. Only a reference to the “Deep State” is missing. As columnist Andrew Coyne wrote more than two years ago, “Pierre Poilievre taps into textbook populism: conjuring unseen enemies in the place of real solutions.”[xv] The problem is that people now are not objecting to this tactic as they did to Harper or Nixon. On the contrary, according to recent public opinion polls more than 40% of Canadians supporting the Conservatives apparently find nothing objectionable about this divisive approach to democratic politics.

The venerable duo of Gilbert and Sullivan, whose comedic operettas almost always had serious and sarcastic political commentary buried under the fluff, warned about this kind of thing back in 1885. In The Mikado, that task was assigned to their fictional Lord High Executioner, Ko-Ko, who warned:

As someday it may happen that a victim must be found

I’ve got a little list, I’ve got a little list

Of society’s offenders who might well be underground

And who never would be missed – who never would be missed!

[i] For all of the stunning details, see T. Dickson, “Improbable Cause: Meet the FBI’s New Boss”. Rolling Stone. Dec. 13, 2024.

[ii] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/dec/13/fbi-kash-patel-senate-support

[iii] https://newrepublic.com/article/188946/kash-patel-fbi-enemies-list

[iv] Op cit.

[v] OP. cit.

[vi] https://apnews.com/article/fbi-trump-patel-fisa-russia-2d215ded96ad8a08689b6f7f0b2d49ec

[vii] Op cit

[viii] https://newrepublic.com/article/188946/kash-patel-fbi-enemies-list