Donald Trump’s FBI pick Kash Patel was key to Republican recasting of Jan. 6 attack
As Republicans' take on the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection evolved from disapproving to defensive, Kash Patel has played a key role in reframing the party's position.
President Donald Trump first condemned the riot after it occurred but by 2023 he was calling the rioters "hostages."
As that messaging changed, Patel, whose confirmation hearing to lead the FBI begins Thursday, was at Trump's side, spreading the revised framework across the MAGA media ecosystem and into mainstream culture.
In March, Patel claimed Democrats knew in advance that the 2021 attack was coming. He previously said that undercover FBI agents spurred rioters to enter the building and that the FBI planned the attack for months − a claim contradicted by a recent Justice Department Inspector General report.
Patel has also given money to alleged rioters through his foundation and even helped produce the patriotic song featuring jailed Jan. 6 defendants that played at Trump campaign rallies.
The Trump transition team did not answer questions about Patel's past statements and financial support for the alleged rioters.
"Kash looks forward to his upcoming hearing as an opportunity to highlight his extensive experience and present the truth to the American people in a comprehensive and meaningful way," Patel's spokeswoman Erica Knight said in response to a list of questions.
Changing the narrative
There's been a concerted effort among conservatives over at least the last two years to muddy the narrative about Jan. 6 defendants, according to Robert Pape, a University of Chicago professor who tracks political violence.
While the Justice Department pursued cases against more than 1,600 people, including 600 on felony charges of assaulting or impeding law enforcement, special counsel Jack Smith prepared a case against Trump on allegations he spurred the mass insurrection.
Meanwhile, far-right media figures increasingly spoke about the defendants as innocent victims swept up in a two-tiered system of justice.
Patel, who was chief of staff to acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller on Jan. 6, was among the most consistent voices casting doubt, Pape said.
“Kash Patel is one of the leading advocates of arguing that this was erroneous, that those who were charged for attacking the Capitol on Jan. 6 were wrongly prosecuted,” Pape said. "Having him now lead the FBI is going to further push the narrative, to change the narrative."
Pape said having Patel at the FBI's helm would further normalize the use of political violence and help convince Americans that the insurrection – which prompted what former U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland called "one of the largest, most complex, and most resource-intensive investigations in our history" – wasn't a serious threat to the country.
Patel's public statements offer a window into his thinking, which strays from commonly accepted fact and into fiction, said constitutional law expert Robert McWhirter, who characterized Patel's comments over the past few years as "propaganda."
It began soon after Trump left Washington. Patel said on his online show, Kash’s Corner on Sept. 30, 2022, that the FBI needed to explain when it placed confidential human sources within militia groups and whether those informants encouraged them to become violent. Patel was an early proponent of the fed-surrection conspiracy theory that undercover FBI agents instigated the Capitol riot with the goal of smearing the MAGA movement. “When did the FBI put those guys in, and where? And did those confidential human sources engage people who are not going to conduct criminal activity and convince them to do so?” he asked.
He alleged that internal FBI documents would show that the agency placed operatives within the militia groups to encourage them to be violent. “What was the FBI doing planning January 6th for a year?” he asked.
Moving mainstream
As more time passed since the insurrection, the GOP's views on it began shifting as well.
By 2022, Rep. Andrew Clyde, R-Ga., compared it to a “normal tourist visit, called the siege "a normal tourist visit" during a congressional hearing. Others described the rioters as respectful.
Patel's early attention focused on Trump supporter Ray Epps who became a target of a conspiracy theory that he was an undercover government agent trying to entrap fellow rioters.
"Here's the one singular thing the Congress can do, put out every piece of information the FBI has on Ray Epps...and why was he allowed to encourage it to incite a riot in and around some events on Jan. 6 as a government employee,” Patel said in an interview with Joe Pags on Feb. 17, 2023. “You're gonna find out he's on the FBI payroll... And he's not going to be the only one that's there.”
No evidence has emerged that Epps was a paid agent or government employee. Epps, his lawyer, the prosecutor and the judge overseeing the case all asserted in open court when Epps pleaded guilty in September 2023 that the conspiracy theory had no merit.
On Tim Pool’s podcast on March 7, 2023, Patel said he could prove "beyond a reasonable doubt" that Epps worked for the FBI, because Epps appeared on the FBI's Most Wanted list after the attack, but was later removed.
"There are only two ways that happens,” he claimed. “You die or you’re an informant.”
Patel also said on the podcast that having informants in the crowd meant the FBI had known for months that the riot was going to happen. “That's a six-month build-up minimum, right? Minimum. It's not like they just dropped them into the Proud Boys," Patel said.
The Department of Justice Inspector General's Jan. 6 report released in mid-December found that though some informants were present, the FBI didn't authorize any confidential source to enter the Capitol.
On the campaign trail
When conservative commentator Tucker Carlson in March 2023 released a heavily edited video of Capitol Police security footage provided by then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) the idea that the insurrection was peaceful gained credibility, Pape, the professor tracking political violence, said. Carlson's video ignored hours of violent and chaotic footage as officers fought the mob for control of the building and instead focused on calmer moments.
Soon after the video aired, Trump began to call those charged in the riot "political prisoners" and patriots. At his first campaign rally in March 2023 and many of his subsequent rallies, Trump played for the crowd a new song produced by Patel.
In the song, Trump recites the Pledge of Allegiance with a recording of about 20 incarcerated Jan. 6 defendants singing "The Star-Spangled Banner" in the background. The song finishes with the defendants chanting "U-S-A!"
Patel, a major campaign surrogate for Trump, continued to reframe the attack in media appearances.
On Mar. 11, 2024, Patel responded in the affirmative when Glenn Beck asked, “Do you think they knew that Jan. 6 was going to happen?” The two had been discussing congressional Democrats and the House Jan. 6 Select Committee. Patel said, “Yes, I think they not only knew but the political monsters... wanted that political narrative."
Financial support
Meanwhile, Patel's Kash Foundation financially supported some rioters and their families, though he has declined to specify how many or in what amounts. The foundation website says it also provides grants to whistleblowers, veterans, active duty service members and people pursuing higher education.
Just days before the election Patel falsely claimed on the podcast Wolfe Untamed that Pelosi asked the Defense Department while the Jan. 6 insurrection was taking place to bring M1 Abrams tanks and “belt-fed” machine guns to the Capitol to quell the riot. He said the point was to make it easier for Trump's opponents to call the attack an insurrection.
"They wanted the political capital of downtown D.C. looking like downtown Kandahar," Patel said. "They wanted those optics because they wanted the insurrection narrative to continue to be rolled out because they knew that might be the only way to kneecap Donald Trump."
MAGA excitement
The chance that Patel might change the narrative on the insurrection has some MAGA activists excited about his nomination to lead the FBI.
Conservative political commentator Julie Kelly said of attorney general nominee Pam Bondi and Patel on Steve Bannon’s War Room last month, "If they are confirmed, are going to have their hands full with fully exposing and holding accountable people” involved in prosecuting Trump like Jack Smith. “They are going to have their hands full with corruption, prosecutorial misconduct.”
It's unclear if Patel's Jan. 6 conspiracy theories will affect his chances of Senate confirmation. Several Democrats have indicated they planned to grill him on the topic, but the support of Trump and the far right, who cheered his nomination, might be too much to overcome.
In a Jan. 16 letter to Patel, committee member Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., included a list of questions about the conspiracy theories he wants Patel to answer Thursday. "A person who promotes and amplifies unverified and harmful conspiracy theories is simply not qualified to serve as the Bureau’s Director," Blumenthal said.