Updated 5:42 pm, September 17, 2025
1 week ago
From Joseph Nepomuceno
The Washington Examiner concludes its live coverage of FBI Director Kash Patel and former CDC Director Susan Monarez’s congressional hearings.
1 week ago
From Kaelan Deese, Samantha-Jo Roth
FBI Director Kash Patel defended his leadership during a combative appearance before the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, fielding sharp criticism from both parties.
The nearly five-hour hearing saw Patel pressed on a wide range of issues, from the FBI’s refusal to release full witness statements in the Jeffrey Epstein case, to the rise in political violence after Charlie Kirk’s assassination, to the director’s defense of deploying the National Guard in Memphis.
Lawmakers also clashed over allegations pushed by Democrats about an alleged cover-up involving Trump’s ties to Epstein, whether more information is coming about the bureau’s use of informants on Jan. 6, and whether the FBI is responding evenly to extremist threats from both the Right and the Left.
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1 week ago
From Emily Hallas
The House Judiciary Committee voted to table, or reject, multiple motions related to the Jeffrey Epstein investigation, including one to investigate Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon’s (D-PA) motion to subpoena Bessent failed. The Republican-led committee also blocked Rep. Eric Swalwell’s (D-CA) effort to subpoena Deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino.
Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) voted with Democrats against both motions to table, as well as another rejected motion from Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX) seeking to subpoena the head of the Bureau of Prisons and its information on its transfer of Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s ex-girlfriend, to another prison.
1 week ago
From Emily Hallas
The House Judiciary Committee voted on Wednesday to block a motion to subpoena several banks for financial records related to Jeffrey Epstein.
The Republican-led committee tabled Rep. Jamie Raskin’s (D-MD) effort to subpoena four banks — Jamie Dimon of JPMorgan Chase, Brian Moynihan of Bank of America, Christian Sewing of Deutsche Bank, and Robin Vince of BNY — for the records.
Raskin said earlier Wednesday that the $1.5 billion worth of transactions are sitting in Epstein’s various bank accounts.
1 week ago
From Emily Hallas
Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK) alleged during congressional questioning that there is a recording to prove Monarez, the former CDC director, is lying about key details regarding her firing by Health and Human Services Director Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
However, Mullin later said he was mistaken, according to PBS. The HHS also said there is no such recording.
Monarez has said for weeks that she was fired because Kennedy politically weaponized the HHS against her and other long-standing officials at the CDC. Kennedy has argued Monarez is part of a corrupt establishment at the agency that has put profits and politics over a commitment to “gold standard science.”
1 week ago
From Emily Hallas
JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon pledged to comply with a threatened subpoena from Raskin that would force his bank to hand over any financial records associated with Epstein.
Raskin revealed on Wednesday that he is seeking to subpoena JPMorgan Chase and three other banks for records related to Epstein. The matter is headed to the House floor for a vote in the next few hours.
“We regret any association with that man at all. And, of course, if it’s a legal requirement, we would conform to it. We have no issue with that,” Dimon told reporters after leaving a Senate GOP lunch, according to Politico. “I think what happened to those women is terrible, and any role we played in it.”
1 week ago
From Emily Hallas
Patel defended the FBI’s decision to move roughly 1,500 agents from the agency’s Washington, D.C., base and disperse them nationwide.
In response to questioning from Rep. Brad Knott (R-NC), Patel said, “It’s pretty simple.”
“You don’t even have to be in law enforcement to know that if you put cops with other cops, they’re going to do cop work. And what was needed in the communities out there was more cops,” he told Knott. “What was not needed in the bloated bureaucracy of Washington, D.C., was a third of the FBI workforce, because a third of the crime does not happen in the Washington, D.C., NCR area.”
1 week ago
From Emily Hallas
Patel committed to opening an FBI investigation into a birthday note Trump allegedly sent to Epstein in the early 2000s.
Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) pressed Patel during the House hearing over the letter that Trump has denied sending to Epstein. Moskowitz asked Patel to “open up an investigation into the Epstein estate for putting out a fake document” based on arguments that the entity “put out a fake signature — a forgery” of Trump’s signature.
Patel replied, “Sure, I’ll do it.”
1 week ago
From Emily Hallas
Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX) labeled Patel “the least qualified in the history of the FBI” on Wednesday.
When Patel said, “That’s false,” Crockett replied, “I didn’t ask you a question. I want to talk about why you’re a failure, and honestly, we need to tell you, ‘bye-bye.'”
“My colleagues have been real nice to you today, and I applaud them, but I don’t have the same demeanor,” she said, prompting pushback from Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH), who defended Patel’s experience.
Crockett continued to attack Patel for his record of targeting “white supremacy,” arguing that the “numbers are very clear” that the issue is a problem, but Patel hasn’t done anything to tackle it.
1 week ago
From Emily Hallas
Patel said the solution to a “rise in political violence and other associated crimes” is to give the FBI “more authorities” to target the private sector.
Following a debate about the role social media platforms played in Kirk’s assassination and other acts of violence against political figures, Patel said, “There are too many online platforms” that don’t have enough government oversight.
They allow children to get online without parents or teachers “knowing anything about it,” Patel said, adding that it’s “not a 1950s America anymore.”
1 week ago
From Emily Hallas
Patel appeared confused when questioned about Dylann Roof, the gunman who murdered nine black people during a Bible study at a South Carolina church in 2015.
When Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-CA) pressed Patel on whether Roof followed “white supremacist propaganda” during the hearing, Patel replied: “Sorry. Dylann Ruth? Roof? Can you give me some more information?”
“You, the head of the FBI?” Kamlager-Dove replied incredulously.
1 week ago
From Emily Hallas
Patel accused Rep. Lucy McBath (D-GA) of disparaging the FBI when she alleged the agency has sidelined valuable resources to help detain illegal immigrants and help Trump’s federal takeover of U.S. cities instead of targeting violence and going after predators.
“Are we failing because we captured four top 10 FBI most wanted from around the world in seven months?” Patel questioned. “Are we failing because we put 1,500 different predators in prison, we dismantled 300 human trafficking networks? … You don’t like that, fine. But don’t you dare disparage the men and women of the FBI who are producing record results in historic fashion to protect this country. They are kicking ass for America, and they’re going to continue to do so.”
Patel’s strong statement was in response to McBath’s assertion that during his tenure, FBI agents “are fully diverting their attention to these anti-immigrant and city takeover operations, leaving our children vulnerable to dangerous networks of online predators, and [that] nationally, you pulled more than 120 FBI agents from their normal duties to operate sobriety checks and conduct traffic stops.”
1 week ago
From Emily Hallas
Dr. Debra Houry, the CDC’s former chief medical officer who recently submitted her resignation due to disagreements over how Kennedy is overseeing the agency, said Wednesday that Kennedy should step down as HHS secretary.
“After seeing his Senate finance testimony, and the number of misstatements, seeing what he has asked our scientists to do, and to compromise our integrity, and the children that have died under his watch, I think he should resign,” she said of Kennedy during the Senate hearing.
Kennedy has defended his actions, saying there is a “deeply embedded, I would say, malaise at the agency” that has sidelined it from a commitment to approaching science without political bias or capitulation to big corporations.
1 week ago
From Emily Hallas
Former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Susan Monarez testified during a separate Senate hearing that Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who oversees the CDC, did not give her a call when the agency faced a fatal shooting last month.
“I did not speak to the secretary until Aug. 11, when he came down to visit,” she told lawmakers.
Monarez has implied Kennedy, whom she has accused of spreading lies about vaccines and other health issues, was partly responsible for fueling the shooting, saying “the dangers of misinformation and its promulgation has now led to deadly consequences.”
1 week ago
From Emily Hallas
Rep. Troy Nehls (R-TX) accused House Democrats of creating a “clown show” during the FBI hearing on Wednesday, suggesting that members are trying to generate publicity to give them a “little bump” in their districts.
“Maybe it’s fundraising, maybe struggling in their district, they need a little bump,” he told FBI Director Kash Patel, appearing to refer to various sparring matches that Democratic Reps. Pramila Jayapal (WA), Dan Goldman (NY), and Jamie Raskin (MD) held with the director. “What we’re seeing unjustly today is all agenda with the same personality, the same objective, and that is, to destroy the [Make America Great Again] movement because you’re effective.”
