Director Patel is taking fire from an ex-FBI podcaster

 Kash Patel's tenure has not been a smooth one.  Now this.

Steven Jensen and other agents filed [a lawsuit] against [Director Kash] Patel and the FBI this month alleging wrongful termination.

[...]

In April, [Patel] promoted [Jensen] to head the prestigious Washington field office. Almost immediately, Patel and his deputy director, Dan Bongino, began to get heat from Trump supporters online over the decision. In social media posts tagging Patel and Bongino, critics let the image-conscious pair know that Jensen had been involved in the FBI’s January 6th investigations

No voice on the right was louder than an ex-FBI agent turned conservative podcaster named Kyle Seraphin. In a steady stream of social media posts, Seraphin dogged Patel’s management of the bureau, including over Jensen’s promotion.

It apparently irritated Patel to no end. According to Jensen, Patel suggested that Jensen sue Seraphin for defamation and even recommended some lawyers.

[...]

In a matter of months, Seraphin has become a mischievous bogeyman for Patel’s operation, using his experience, sources within the agency, and pugnacious online persona to constantly goad the director.

[...]

In Jensen’s telling, Patel said a defamation lawsuit would get some pressure off of Patel. Jensen ultimately declined to go after Seraphin. He told Patel that he was “unconcerned with the viewpoints of online personalities.”

[...]

Elsewhere in the suit are other data points. For example, the head of the Las Vegas field office was told to stop posting on social media and ultimately fired after being criticized by Seraphin.

[...]

Beyond the lawsuit, there are even more examples [of Patel's problems]. The New York Times reported last week that Patel fired another agent at the bureau after Seraphin falsely claimed that agent was central to the FBI’s Mar-a-Lago raid.

“Are you really listening to this guy?” former FBI acting director Brian Driscoll asked Patel about Seraphin at one point, according to the Times report. Driscoll is another of the three fired personnel in the lawsuit against Patel.

[...]

The FBI declined a request for comment. But Seraphin seems to be reveling in the idea that he’s got Patel spooked. He told me he was happy to point out Patel’s “incompetent, bumbling actions” for the whole world to see, and agreed that he seems to live in Patel’s head.

“It very much appears that he understands that he’s way out of his depth,” Seraphin said.

  The Bulwark

Evidenced in his Senate hearing.

[Seraphin] was suspended in 2022 in a dispute over the bureau’s COVID rules. He then rose to prominence as a right-wing whistleblower after complaining to Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) about the FBI’s treatment of parents at school-board meetings.

I missed that story.

Seraphin was actually once on friendly terms with Patel. He says he received $10,000 from Patel’s “Kash Foundation” nonprofit in 2022 when he was “essentially homeless” after leaving the FBI. And he said he met Patel in person a handful of times, in addition to also appearing on Bongino’s podcast.

If he has a primary grievance with Patel, he insisted, it is that Patel hasn’t shaken up the bureau enough.

[...]

Patel himself hasn’t sued Seraphin, but someone else in his circle eventually did: Last month, Patel’s girlfriend, country singer Alexis Wilkins, sued the podcaster for suggesting that she’s a Mossad agent “honeypot” out to control Patel and cover up the Jeffrey Epstein case. Wilkins is being represented by Jesse Binnall, Patel’s personal lawyer and a member of his nonprofit’s board.

For his part, Seraphin said he meant Wilkins was a “honeypot” in a positive way.

“It’s kind of a compliment, actually,” he said.

[...]

In addition to tangling with Patel, he has also tweaked another prominent right-wing figure. In July, he was deposed in undercover right-wing video operative James O’Keefe’s legal battle with O’Keefe’s former Project Veritas nonprofit, after Seraphin posted leaked lewd messages between O’Keefe and his girlfriend, a star of the Netflix reality show Selling the OC.

The deposition video, which O’Keefe posted online, shows Seraphin gleefully taunting O’Keefe and his lawyer, describing O’Keefe as being of “low moral character.” At one point, O’Keefe’s lawyer asked Seraphin what he meant when he posted that O’Keefe should “FOAD.”

“It’s commonly understood to mean ‘F Off and Die,’” Seraphin responded.

What world are we living in?