No, Trump’s FBI director pick Kash Patel didn’t call the agency ‘gay’

After President-elect Donald Trump tapped one of his loyal allies, Kash Patel, as FBI director, some social media users claimed Patel immediately disparaged the agency.

A Dec. 1 X post showed a screenshot of a post Patel supposedly shared on the platform a day after Trump’s announcement. The post read, "The FBI is gay and retarded."

(Screenshot from X)

Although Patel has been critical of the FBI, this post is fake.

PolitiFact searched Patel’s X account, which was created Dec. 1, and found no such post about the FBI. We also found no news reports about Patel saying this.

Patel, the child of Indian immigrants, started his law career as a public defender in Florida. He then worked as a federal prosecutor in the Justice Department before serving in various national security and defense roles during the first Trump administration.

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As a House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence staff member, Patel helped lead the committee’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. He was then tapped for roles in the Trump administration, including deputy assistant to the president and senior director for counterterrorism at the National Security Council and chief of staff to acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller.

Patel has promised to make drastic changes to the FBI’s footprint if the Senate approves his nomination. In a September interview on the "Shawn Ryan Show" podcast, Patel said he would "shut down" the FBI’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., "on Day 1 and reopen it the next day as a museum of the deep state."

Patel’s nomination means the current FBI director, Christopher Wray, will likely be forced out of his position two years before his 10-year term expires. Trump nominated Wray in 2017 after firing Wray’s predecessor James Comey.

We rate the claim that Patel posted on X that "the FBI is gay" False.