A leading Democratic congressman has laid into “unserious” FBI Director Kash Patel for scribbling self-help notes during a Jeffrey Epstein grilling on Capitol Hill.
Patel, a former cigar entrepreneur, children’s book author, and MAGA podcaster, endured two days of interrogation from the House Judiciary Committee last month. A Getty Images photograph revealed that he had written himself notes of praise after clashes with lawmakers—including California Democrat Eric Swalwell—as they probed his handling of the Epstein case.
The four lines read, “Good fight w/ Swalwell,” “Hold the line,” “Brush off their attacks,” and “Rise above next line of [illegible] attacks.” It appears the illegible word could be “partisan.”
Swalwell has now addressed the motivational messages, calling the under-fire FBI chief “unserious.”
“I don’t know if he thought it was something, like, entertaining? But to me, as a former sex trafficking prosecutor, I went there with a principal objective of understanding what is going on in the biggest sex trafficking case of the United States, the Epstein case. And he clearly chose to protect and defend Donald Trump rather than those victims, and I look at this and it just shows me how unserious he is,” he told Cassie Semyon from Spectrum News.
Swalwell reiterated his concern that Patel might not be up to the job. “I think about people who expect the FBI director to protect us from terrorism, to protect us from child sex trafficking, to protect us from political corruption, and you see this and it just reinforces that he’s probably not up for that job and probably makes us all a lot less safer than we want to be,” he said.
He added that he “wouldn’t trust” anything the Trump administration releases about the Epstein files.
It transpired that the FBI director needed all the positive affirmation he could get after two days of hardened testimony last month.
Patel engaged in shouting matches with Adam Schiff and Cory Booker as the Democratic senators grilled him on the FBI’s bungled manhunt for Charlie Kirk’s shooter and accused him of being a pawn in an Epstein cover-up.
On the second day of grilling, Patel revealed he couldn’t remember the name of Charleston church shooter Dylann Roof.
Swalwell, meanwhile, said on Wednesday that dozens of Republicans are planning to turn on Trump and support legislation requiring the Department of Justice to release files related to Epstein.
“It’s coming to an end guys. I’ve spoken to a lot of House Republicans this week and they’ve confided that Trump’s movement/support is fading. As one told me, ‘this Epstein bomb is about to drop and no [one] wants to defend a pedo-protector. It’s just a matter of time,’” Swalwell said in a thread on the social platform X.
“One Republican just texted me that if there’s a discharge vote on Epstein they expect a ‘jail break’ of over 100 members. Trump will go nuts!” he added.
The FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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