Former Trump administration official Kash Patel accused the Department of Justice on Monday of putting him at personal risk by leaving his name unredacted in the FBI's affidavit used for the raid on former President Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate.
Patel, who served as chief of staff to the acting secretary of defense during the Trump administration, told Tucker Carlson that by including his name in the affidavit, the DOJ was "publicly advertising for me to fail, to go to jail and to be harmed."
Patel's name was mentioned in the affidavit in reference to a statement he made in May claiming that Trump had already declassified the classified materials that were recovered by FBI agents during the raid. The next eight sections of the affidavit after the Patel reference are fully redacted.
"This DOJ with the same leadership that authorized Russiagate is now back in charge, had gone in to intentionally lift the redaction of just my name and then redact the next seven consecutive pages. It was totally for political purposes," Patel said during an appearance on "Tucker Carlson Tonight." "They don’t care about the threats to my life, the racist messages, and the hatred I see every day now because they are publicly advertising for me to fail, to go to jail, and to be harmed."
Disgraced former FBI official Peter Strzok shared a screenshot of Patel's name in the redacted affidavit on Twitter over the weekend, telling Patel to "Get a great F'ing criminal defense lawyer," because "you’re going to need it."
Patel said Strzok, who was fired in 2018 for sending out anti-Trump texts. carries a grudge against him because of his role as lead investigator of Russiagate, which "is the reason Strzok got fired along with 16 other FBI officials, including Andy McCabe… Comey and the like."
"Their corrupt cabal is back…so the corruption continues," Patel added. "They are biased, their hypocrisy knows no bounds but of course, they're shameless. Peter Strzok, as a [former] counter-intel head agent, knows that Americans' names in search warrants are supposed to be redacted."
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Patel said he believes the raid on Trump's home was conducted to prevent the disclosure of documents that would expose their "corrupt actives" surrounding the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and beyond.
"This entire raid on his house, I believe, was to prevent the disclosure now that the government gangsters are back in charge, of their corrupt activities from Russiagate on down," he said. "Because now, they have an open FBI counterintelligence investigation. They will shield any release of documents because they will say they have an open investigation. Congress has a lot of work to do."
