President Trump on Saturday praised FBI Director Kash Patel following the capture of a suspect in the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
“I am very proud of the FBI,” Trump told Fox News Digital. “Kash—and everyone else—they have done a great job.”
Patel, a Trump loyalist with less experience than previous FBI directors, has faced criticism, including from the right, over his handling of the manhunt that ultimately captured suspect Tyler Robinson.
The search, which ended after less than two days when Robinson allegedly confessed to his father and later turned himself in to police, saw a series of embarrassing moments for the FBI, including Patel prematurely announcing a suspect had been captured only to backtrack.
“Historically, the FBI has been very cautious about releasing information to ensure that when they do, it is accurate,” former FBI agent Katherine Schweit, author of Stop the Killing: How to End the Mass Shooting Crisis and How to Talk About Guns With Anyone, told The Independent earlier this week, pointing to the unusual nature of Patel’s posts about the investigation.
Behind the scenes, meanwhile, Patel reportedly berated his fellow agents for not immediately showing him a photo of the suspect that had been found, even though the image was reportedly already in Patel’s briefing materials, The Washington Post reports.
Morale is low inside the bureau, and Patel is seen as “crumbling under pressure,” sources told the newspaper.
The assassination, one of the biggest tests yet of Patel’s leadership, came as the director had led a series of firings of top agents, including three decorated FBI leaders who sued earlier this week, claiming they had been targeted for perceived disloyalty to Trump. Leadership reshuffles meant that the Salt Lake City FBI field office, which helped lead the Kirk shooter manhunt, was led by an agent with less than a month on the job.
Influential right-wing activist Christopher Rufo wrote on X that Patel had “performed terribly” in the search.
“We would be wise to take a moment and ask whether Kash Patel has what it takes to get this done,” Rufo continued. “I’ve been on the phone the last few days with many conservative leaders, all of whom wholeheartedly support the Trump Administration and none of whom are confident that the current structure of the FBI is up to this task.”
“Thoroughly unimpressed with Kash Patel after this,” conservative media figure John Cardillo wrote on X. “Public info releases from the Bureau have been clumsy and sloppy.”
Others on the online far-right reportedly mocked Patel for saying, after the gunman’s capture, that the FBI director would meet Kirk “in Valhalla,” the afterlife realm for warriors in Norse mythology.
According to the suit from former agents, Patel and a top deputy, former podcaster and Secret Service agent Dan Bongino, allegedly told FBI officials that they should be “posting more about their successful investigations and other ‘FBI wins’ on social media.”
