'Won't escape history’s judgement': John Bolton issues a warning to Republican senators

10 December 2024

Former National Security Adviser John Bolton, who served in the first Trump Administration, has been vehemently critical of some of the far-right MAGA Republicans who President-elect Donald Trump has chosen for his second one — including former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (the ex-Democrat he has in mind for national intelligence director) and conspiracy theorist Kash Patel (Trump's pick for FBI director).

In an op-ed published by the Wall Street Journal on December 10, Bolton strongly urges GOP senators to reject Patel in 2025.

"Too many of Mr. Trump's personnel selections evidence his assiduous search for personal fealty, not loyalty to the Constitution," Bolton complains. "Kash Patel's nomination as director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation squarely fits this pattern."

Bolton recalls that during Trump's first presidency, Patel "proved to be less interested in his assigned duties than in worming his way into Mr. Trump’s presence."

"His conduct in Mr. Trump's first term and thereafter indicates that as FBI director, he would operate according to Lavrenty Beria's reported comment to Joseph Stalin: 'Show me the man, and I'll show you the crime,'" Bolton warns. "Mr. Patel has frequently called for investigations of journalists, comments he has since tried to walk back. He has been accused of seeking to declassify sensitive information for political rather than legitimate national-security reasons."

The hawkish neocon adds, "During Mr. Trump's first term, both Attorney General William Barr and Central Intelligence Agency Director Gina Haspell threatened to resign if Mr. Patel was forced on them as deputy FBI or CIA director, respectively."

Bolton argues that FBI Director Christopher Wray should remain in that position — not be fired by Trump to make way for Patel.

"If Mr. Trump is determined, wrongly, to remove Christopher Wray as FBI director," Bolton says, "there are previous examples of appointees who restored faith in a battered Justice Department and FBI. In 1975, President Gerald Ford selected Edward Levi, dean of the University of Chicago Law School, as attorney general, and in 1978, President Jimmy Carter named Judge William Webster, a Republican, to be FBI director. Mr. Patel is no Ed Levi or Bill Webster."

The former national security adviser adds, "To resolve questions over his integrity and fitness, a full-field FBI investigation, as prior nominees have undergone, is warranted. With more facts available and less rhetoric, the result will be clear. I regret I didn't fully discern Mr. Patel's threat immediately. But we are now all fairly warned. Senators won't escape history’s judgment if they vote to confirm him."

John Bolton's full Wall Street Journal op-ed is available at this link (subscription required)=

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