President Donald Trump took questions from reporters on Tuesday and gave an eyebrow-raising response when asked if he had confidence in his FBI director, Kash Patel.
“Do you have complete confidence in Kash Patel? What are you hoping comes from his testimony on the hill today?” a reporter asked Trump.
“Well, first of all, I think that Pam Bondi has done an unbelievable job, and everybody agrees with that,” Trump replied.
Attorney General Pam Bondi and Patel feuded in July after Deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino threatened to leave his job if Bondi stayed in hers. Reports later indicated that Patel had joined Bongino in threatening to resign if Bondi stayed in her role, as anger mounted against Bondi’s contradictory claims on whether or not Jeffrey Epstein kept a client list. Trump ended the feud by publicly backing Bondi.
Only after praising Bondi did Trump pivot to Patel:
And Kash, I — you know, if you look at — take a look at what he did with respect to this horrible person that he just captured. He did it in two days. It took other similar cases — four days, five days, four years, if you look at certain shooters.
“Now, I felt — I have confidence in everybody in the administration. My administration, and a lot of people are saying it, not just me. It’s so far the best administration ever formed,” Trump concluded.
Patel testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday and was asked about a wide range of topics, everything from the investigation into the murder of Charlie Kirk, to the Epstein case, to allegations of purging Trump critics at the FBI.
Watch the clip above.
