John (5:22)

Foreign thanks Isaac and welcome everybody. Here are your quick hits for today. First up, the United States and Ukraine agreed to terms on a deal to develop Ukraine's critical mineral resources. The draft of the agreement reportedly does not include US Security guarantees. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is reportedly planning to visit the White House on Friday to formalize the deal. Number two the House of Representatives voted 217 to 215 to adopt the GOP's budget resolution, which provides a framework for the party's spending priorities. Representative Thomas Massie, the Republican from Kentucky, was the lone Republican to vote against the resolution, which now heads to the Senate. 3. The Conference Board's consumer confidence index fell to 98.3 in February, the lowest reading since June 2024 and the largest monthly drop since August20. Number four a federal judge ordered the State Department and the U.S. agency for International Development to unfreeze foreign aid funding within two days. At number five, Representative Byron Donalds, the Republican from Florida, announced his 2026 candidacy for governor of Florida. Current Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is ineligible to seek another term after eight years in.

Tony (6:54)

This is the first day on the job for newly confirmed FBI Director Kash Patel.

Isaac Saul (6:58)

His nomination passed the Senate yesterday, but just barely, as changes to the bureau are already taking place.

John (7:06)

Critics of the Trump administration would say the FBI had not deviated from its core mission and was not politicized. So that's a bit of a political argument he's bringing. And that's what concerns so many Trump critics, that there is a Trump loyalist running the bureau, which is supposed to be independent of politics and making non political arguments. On Thursday, the Senate confirmed Kashyap Kash Patel as the next Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Patel was a former federal prosecutor who served in the White House during President Donald Trump's first term and is viewed by many as a Trump loyalist. On Sunday, Trump announced that Patel had named Dan Bongino as Deputy FBI director. Bongino is a popular conservative podcaster who served in the New York Police Department and the Secret Service. To back up a little then, President Elect Trump nominated Patel as FBI director in November, praising Patel for his resistance to the investigation into Trump, for alleged collusion with Russia and for his service in Trump's first administration. In January, Patel faced a contentious five hour hearing in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee and was later confirmed 51 to 49, with Republican senators Susan Collins from Maine and Lisa Murkowski from Alaska joining every Democrat in voting against his nomination. Patel is the first person of color to lead the FBI. You can read our coverage on Patel's nomination and his confirmation hearing with links in today's episode. Description Unlike other Senate confirmed appointments, the FBI head serves a 10 year term, though former FBI director and Trump appointee Christopher Wray resigned early, clearing the way for Patel's nomination. Conversely, Bongino's appointment does not require Senate confirmation. The Deputy director serves as the FBI's second in command, responsible for day to day operations and is typically a career agent. However, despite his background in law enforcement, Bongino has not worked for the FBI. He has run for Congress three times and built a prominent media following, having hosted podcasts as well as talk shows on NRA TV and Fox News. Both Patel and Bongino have made controversial statements prior to their nominations. Patel has insinuated that the January 6 riot was provoked by agitators and was questioned during his confirmation hearing for not plainly stating that President Joe Biden won the 2020 election and for publishing a list of enemies in his book Government Gangsters. Bongino has stated that the 2020 election was rigged and was banned from YouTube in 2022 for comments he made questioning COVID 19 vaccines and mask mandates. He's a cops cop, patel said of Bongino. Welcome aboard Dan. The country needs strong leadership and I know you will serve with honor and dedication. Today we'll get into what the right and the left are saying about Patel's confirmation and his appointment of Bongino and then Isaac's tape.

Isaac Saul (10:09)

We'll be right back after this quick break.

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John (11:43)

Alright, first up, let's start with what the right is saying. The right is mostly supportive of Patel and Bongino, arguing they will clean up the FBI's excesses. Some say Bongino has a strong vision for the agency despite his lack of qualifications. Others worry that Patel will prioritize Trump's wishes over reasonable reform. In the Federalist, Beth Brelj argued that Patel has a popular mandate to clean house at the corrupt FBI. Patel enters with his eyes wide open and a solid idea of where to look for the bad actors that cost this nation millions in bogus political investigations designed to stop or hobble Trump's agenda during his last term. Breljay said Patel unraveled Russiagate debunked the Steele dossier at the core of the Crossfire hurricane, the FBI investigation that falsely claimed Trump colluded with Russians during the presidential campaign against Hillary Clinton. Others welcomed Patel, who was endorsed by organizations representing more than 680,000 law enforcement officers and by dozens of former and current FBI agents, state attorneys general and U.S. attorneys. Senator Chuck Grassley, the Republican from Iowa, said on the Senate floor the day before Patel was confirmed. It won't be surprising when the media that has long partnered with the FBI continues to write negative stories about Patel doing the necessary work of cleaning up corruption within the FBI. In hot Air, Ed Morrissey said cash Patel gets a hatchet man at the FBI. Bongino's appointment sends a very clear message that Trump wants to clear the decks at the FBI and the rank and file had better get ready for it. This is not just a Doge deadwood clearing exercise. Trump means to ring all of the political chicanery out of the FBI and do it toot sweet, morrissey wrote. Bongino has enough qualifications to justify the pick. However, it's still a bit curious. First, I assume Bongino might step up for Secret Service director where his experience fits better. The fit at Secret Service would have been self explaining, but seems a little less apt at the FBI. The benefit of having a rank and file agent in that position is that such an appointment will help connect the new director to the everyday realities at the bureau, as well as maintain operational status quo and equilibrium. Clearly, operational status quo and equilibrium are not what Trump has in mind, however, and that's why an outsider like Bongino makes sense, morrissey said. The trick will be to get rid of the others without pushing out those who truly contribute and balancing reform zeal with organizational wisdom. Let's hope both Patel and Bongino are up to the task. In Reason, Jacob Sullim asked, will FBI Director Kash Patel be a principled reformer or a Trump hatchet man? Patel's public comments and published works provide plenty of reason to be skeptical of his new Persona. In his podcast interviews, he comes across as a reckless partisan whose overridden concern is loyalty to Trump, sollam wrote. However, Patel also highlights the threat to civil liberties posed by surveillance justified in the name of national security. He says applications for warrants under the Federal Intelligence Surveillance act should always be vetted by the Justice Department instead of the FBI's general counsel. On the face of it, putting a harsh FBI critic in charge of the agency is a welcome development. But this particular critic also has a history of advocating politically motivated investigations even while condemning them. The question is whether Patel can move beyond his Trump centric critique of the FBI and apply his avowed principles consistently, which might require resisting the president's repeatedly expressed desire to punish his political opponents under the guise of enforcing the law. Patel's record as an embarrassingly obscent Trump toady does not inspire much confidence on that score. Alright, that is for what the right is saying. Which brings us to what the left is saying. The left is critical of Patel's confirmation, suggesting that he was nominated to target Trump's enemies. Some say Bongino's appointment is antithetical to the Trump administration's supposed emphasis on merit. Others say Patel and Bongino will transform the FBI into an unrecognizable institution. In New York magazine, Andrew Rice wrote, the FBI is bracing for payback. Under Patel, Patel will now take control of an institution with the capacity to surveil, interrogate and arrest. He will sit in a building named for Hoover, the bureau's complicated patriarch who put its powers to political and sometimes illegal uses for presidents from Coolidge to Nixon, Rice said. Since the revelation of Hoover's abuses in the 1970s, each subsequent director kept a deliberate distance from the president he served. But the next FBI director and Trump could not be more closely aligned in their plans, Patel has articulated some substantive proposals for structural reforms. Government Gangsters contain several incongruously wonky chapters that read like they're coming from a former public defender. He says he wants greater transparency and increased safeguards for civil liberties, rice wrote. But in Patel, Trump picked a director who will take his phone calls and respond to his interests, and it is not hard to guess what he will want next. Patel has theorized that once he clears out, the disloyal cooperators in the government will offer incriminating information about the Deep State. In the New York Times, Michelle Goldberg said Bongino has it out for the commie libs. Bongino's boss, of course, will be Kash Patel, the Trump world enforcer whom the supine Senate confirmed as FBI director last week. During his confirmation hearings, Patel insisted that despite publishing an actual enemies list of people he considered Deep State villains, he had no intention of turning the FBI into an instrument of retribution. It seemed obvious at the time that he was lying. Making Bongino his deputy simply rubs it in our faces. If you wanted to turn the FBI into a Trumpist praetorian guard, Bongino is exactly the kind of guy you'd hire. This administration professes a devotion to merit based hiring, blaming diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives for fostering mediocrity. It should go without saying, however, that excellence is of little interest to the Trumpists, who delight in scandalizing a meritocracy that spurned them, goldberg wrote. We're in an uncanny interregnum where Trump and his coterie are laying the foundation for autocracy but have yet to fully consolidate their power. An FBI run by Patel and Bongino is a sign that the system, which for all of its manifold flaws has provided Americans a level of stability uncommon in history, is falling apart. In msnbc, Steve Bennon asked if the FBI will ever be the same. The deputy director position is effectively responsible for running the bureau's day to day operations. As the New York Times reported, it is a complicated and grueling job that requires working closely with foreign partners and navigating sensitive investigations. For generations, the administrative position has gone to senior agents with extensive FBI experience, Benon said. Trump instead chose a podcaster with literally no FBI experience for the job. The fact that Bongino worked as a Secret Service agent and an NYPD officer is of interest, but it's also not altogether relevant. The president wants an unqualified conservative media personality to help run the FBI's operations, and so an unqualified conservative media personality will now help run the FBI's operations. Even by Trump's standards, this is truly bonkers. Bennon wrote. This is a step a president takes when he wants to tear down the FBI and turn it into something new and twisted. And I don't doubt there will be an institution called the Federal Bureau of Investigation, but with Patel and Bongino at the helm, it will not be the FBI. All right, let's head over to Isaac for his take.

Isaac Saul (19:52)

All right, that is it for what the left and the right are saying. Which brings us to my take. Let's play a game. I'm going to share seven quotes. Some of them are real things Kash Patel and Dan Bongino have said. Some of them are made up. Let's see if you can spot the fake ones. Number one, we're blessed by God to have Donald Trump be our juggernaut of justice, to be our leader, to be our continued warrior in the arena. Number two, my recommendation is Donald Trump should ignore this court order. Who's going to arrest him? The marshals. You guys know who the US Marshals work for? The Department of Justice. That is under the. Oh, yeah, the executive branch. Donald Trump is going to order his own arrest. This is ridiculous. Number three, the only thing that matters now is power. That is all that matters. No, it doesn't. We have a system of checks and balances. Ha. That's a good one. That's really funny. We do. Number four. The irony about this for the scumbag commie libs is that the cold civil war they're pushing for will end really badly for them. Libs are the biggest pussies I've ever seen, and they use others to do their dirty work. Their mamas are still doing their laundry for them as they celebrate tonight that their long sought goal of the destruction of the Republic has been reached. But they're not ready for what comes next. Number five. My entire life now is about owning the libs. Number six. And you've got to harness that following that Q of QAnon has garnered and just sort of tweak it a little bit. That's all I'm saying. He should get credit for all the things he has accomplished because it's hard to establish a movement. And number seven, we're going to come after the people in the media who lied about American citizens, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections. We're going to come after you. Whether it's criminally or civilly. We'll figure that out. But yeah, we're putting you all on notice. End quote. I'm just kidding. All of these quotes are real. 1, 6 and 7 were things Kash Patel has said. 2, 3, 4 and 5 are all real things. Dan Bongino has said. It isn't hard to understand how he got here. During Donald Trump's first term, he surrounded himself with some of the shadiest and most corrupt people in politics. The Paul Manafort of the world invited questions about his connections to places like Russia. Those questions turned into a media frenzy. That media frenzy drove FBI investigations. Those investigations led to a special counsel. That special counsel nearly cost Trump his presidency. I've written before about the many things we got wrong about Trump and Russia. I don't want to re litigate all of it here, but I think Trump both deserved to be investigated and also was not guilty of colluding with Russia to win the 2016 election. As I feared at the time, one of the great consequences of the Trump investigation, the reason I desperately wanted the federal government's probe to be on the up and up in every manner, was the politicized arms race that set it off. Once you open that Pandora's box, there is no going back, especially not in the American partisan warfare of the 21st century. Of all the ways the Trump investigation could have gone, our current reality is one of the worst possible iterations. Not only did it fail to land any kind of conviction, but the investigators committed some legitimate malpractice. Not only did this destroy trust in the FBI and the media for half the country, but it watered down the potency of the other FBI investigation. At the conclusion of Trump's term, which included his home being raided, not only did Trump not walk off into the sunset, but he left the January 6 riot behind him on the way out. Not only did Trump refuse to leave the political arena, but he got reelected, survived two assassination attempts on the way back, and inherited a country somehow more divided than the one he left us in January of 2021. Not only is he back in office now, but he won on a campaign largely centered around personal grievances and a promise of reven. And Trump, quite literally is taking no chances. He has no interest in depoliticizing federal institutions like the FBI. He wants to remake them in his mold. He has no interest in leaving anything in the past. He wants payback. He wants to fire every lawyer that was hired under Biden and fire every prosecutor that was involved, not just in the Russia hoax, but also in prosecuting January 6, a day full of very real crimes. All of These motivations are evident in putting Cash Patel at the head of the FBI. When Patel was first tapped by Trump, I wrote about a phenomenon I described as the Trump circularity. When Trump does some norm breaking thing, for better or for worse, that puts all of our political footing onto new ground that he then gets to define to his own political advantage. And around we go. We often live in the Trump circularity and he is incredibly good at keeping us there. Cash Patel and Dan Bongino are part of this circularity. Patel at least has some relevant experience, but I'm not thrilled about him leading the bureaucracy. Patel has openly promised retribution against Trump's political enemies. He's made his entire career a loyalty show to Trump. He said the figure at the center of the QAnon cult should get credit for all the things he has accomplished. He hawks dietary supplements to reverse the vax and get healthy. And he claims he's going to crack down on leakers and prosecute journalists. He also still will not admit that Joe Biden won the 2020 election, and we found out during his confirmation hearing he has a massive conflict of interest in China. All of this might be why former Attorney General Bill Barr, upon hearing Trump was considering Patel at the FBI during his first term, famously responded, over my dead body. Well, Barr is now a TV pundit and Patel is the head of the FBI. Say what you want about James Comey or Christopher Wray and there's plenty to criticize, but neither of them is even close to his politically compromised as Patel. They're not even in the same galaxy. And if the politicization of the FBI is a thing you are worried about and loathe, if you were mad about Comey undermining Hillary Clinton or investigating Trump or upset rays FBI raided a president's home, then this is the wrong direction to go. This leads us deeper down the hole. As for Bongino, well, he's someone even more out there. A personal disclosure here. Soon after Trump came into office in 2016, before he was a famous podcaster, Bongino was constantly spreading easy to debunk nonsense on Twitter and I used to call him out on it. We tangled on social media pretty regularly, arguing and calling each other not so nice names. In response, he blocked me. And then I watched his star rise slowly at first and then all at once. And now he's a major celebrity with the online right. Mostly his fame was driven by the kind of nonsense I used to call him out for. In this line of work, I'm always conscious how my readers and listeners might view me. I'm wary sometimes of being too hard on one side of the aisle for consecutive days. We have a politically diverse audience looking for fair takes and a diversity of viewpoints. But in the My Take section, my promise is not to seek a centrist position or toe the line. Instead, my promise is to be honest, even if it's inconvenient for me and risky for my business. And the honest truth is that Kash Patel is an alarming FBI director with a smattering of good ideas that, weighed against everything else he said and done, completely fail to reassure us that he will act apolitically and in respect of the law. I'm not naive and sycophantic enough about the government to believe the FBI is some deeply ethical, non political organization. It isn't and never has been. But it just got a lot worse. Bongino leading these agents is just simply hard to fathom. He's so radical again, just read a few sample quotes above and so power hungry that I struggle to imagine what he'll try to do with so much control. My only hope is that there are still enough ethical and law abiding agents and lawyers among the FBI's roughly 38,000 employees to check Patel and Bon Chino's worst desires from manifesting. But I can't say I'm enthusiastic about our odds. We'll be right back after this quick break.

Tony (27:39)

G'day America. It's Tony and Ryan from the Tony and Ryan Podcast From Down Under. This episode is sponsored by Boost Mobile, the newest 5G network in the country. These guys are no longer the prepaid wireless company you might remember. They've invested billions into building their own 5G towers across America, transforming the carrier into America's fourth major network alongside the other big dogs. Yep, they're challenging the competitors by working harder and smarter, like this amazing new network they've literally built. They have blazing fast 5G and plans for all the latest devices. Visit your nearest Boost Mobile store or find them online@boostmobile.com Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile.

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Isaac Saul (28:59)

All right, that is it for my take. We're skipping today's reader qu and I'll be back tomorrow, so I'm gonna send it back to John. Have a good one. Peace.

John (29:08)

Thanks, Isaac. Here's your under the Radar story for today, folks. The Texas Department of State Health Services reported its first death in a measles outbreak that has infected at least 124 people in the state across nine counties, Texas largest outbreak in decades. Measles is one of the most contagious viruses in the world. It can be transmitted through the air and on surfaces, and it spreads mostly among people who are not vaccinated against the viru. Texas says almost all of the confirmed cases are in people who are either unvaccinated or whose vaccination status could not be confirmed. Health experts worry that the case count will continue to rise in the coming weeks, noting that the outbreak corresponds with decreasing rates of childhood vaccinations nationwide. The Associated Press has the latest on this story, and the Dallas Morning News has the background on the outbreak. Both are linked in today's episode Description Next up is our numbers section. The number of confirmed directors in the history of the Federal Bureau of investigation is 9. The number of FBI directors confirmed between 1935 and 2001 is 5. The number of FBI directors confirmed Between 2001 and 2025 is 4. The number of confirmed deputy directors in the history of The FBI is 19. The number of FBI deputy directors confirmed between 1930 and 2001 is 10. The number of FBI directors confirmed between 2002 and 2025 is 9. The Dam Bongino Show's rank of Podtrek's list of top US podcasts in January 2025 is number 7. The percentage of US adults who are extremely or somewhat confident the FBI will act in a fair and nonpartisan manner during Donald Trump's second term is 52%, according to a January 2025 APNORC poll. And the percentage of Democrats and Republicans, respectively, who are extremely or somewhat confident the FBI will act in a fair and nonpartisan manner during Donald Trump's second term is 44% and 63%. And last but not least, our have a nice day story. In 1960, Ruby Bridges faced the monumental challenge of being the first black student to integrate into an all white school in the South. Now Bridges has published a children's book about the experience that she describes as a love letter to her first grade teacher Barbara Henry. Unlike the teachers who quit their jobs to avoid teaching black children, Henry taught six year old Bridges in an empty classroom and became her best friend. I wouldn't have gotten through that if it hadn't been for my teacher, bridges said. Despite all of the hate that was going on outside, inside that room, it was filled with love. Today has this story and there's a link in today's episode description. All right everyone, that is it for today's episode. As always, if you'd like to support our work, Please go to readtangle.com where you can sign up for a newsletter membership, podcast membership or a bundled membership that gets you the best discount we have. We'll be right back here tomorrow. For Isaac and the rest of the crew, this is John Law signing off. Have a great day y'all. Peace.

Isaac Saul (32:20)

Our podcast is written by me, Isaac Saul and edited and engineered by Duke Thomas. Our script is edited by Ari Weitzman, Will K Back daily, Saul and Sean Brady. The logo for our podcast was made by Magdalena Bova, who is also our social Media manager. The music for the podcast was produced by Diet75. And if you are looking for more from Tangle, please go check out our website@readtangle.com that's readtangle.com Dear old work Platform. It's not you, it's us.

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