FBI’s Patel and Bongino defend reforms amid internal criticism report

FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy Director Dan Bongino objected to a scathing report from an alliance of active-duty and retired FBI members that portrayed the bureau as directionless under its new leadership, championing sweeping reforms that they say have brought major gains in accountability and public safety.

“When the director and I advanced these reforms, we expected some noise from the small circle of disgruntled former agents still loyal to the old Comey-Wray model,” Bongino told Fox News Digital on Wednesday.

FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy Director Dan Bongino are facing criticism from agency staff for running the bureau under their watch. (Chris Samuels/The Salt Lake Tribune via Getty Images; Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)

“That has never been our audience. Our responsibility is to the American people. And under the new leadership, the office is delivering results this country hasn’t seen in decades: stronger accountability, higher performance standards, billions saved, and a mission-driven culture. That’s how you restore trust.”

Miranda Devine, New York Post columnist and Fox News contributor said last week that a 115-page internal report written by active-duty and retired FBI agents and analysts has heavily criticized Patel and Bongino since they took their respective positions earlier this year.

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Dan Bongino speaks with FBI Director Kash Patel as they attend the annual 9/11 Commemoration Ceremony at the National September 11 Memorial and Museum in New York, September 11, 2025. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)

The alliance criticized Patel as “in over his head” and Bongino as “kind of a clown,” according to the New York Post.

The outlet said the 115-page assessment was written in the style of an FBI intelligence product and analyzed reports from 24 FBI sources and subsources who described their experiences in the bureau.

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Devine said Patel had been described by multiple internal sources as inexperienced, with one source saying he “had neither the breadth of experience nor the look that an FBI director needs to be successful.”

Patel told Fox News Digital that the FBI was “operating exactly as the country expects.”

FBI Director Kash Patel at a news conference following the shooting of West Virginia National Guardsmen in Washington. (Andrew Leyden/Getty Images)

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“Every reform we made this year had a single goal: to build an FBI that was faster, stronger, more accountable, and fully aligned with protecting the American people. We streamlined the structure, pushed Washington’s talent back into the field, expanded our national security capabilities with new tools like the Counter-Drone School, overhauled FOIA responsiveness, and eliminated billions in waste,” he said.

“The impact is undeniable: historic decline in crime, major dismantling of criminal and extremist networks and record arrests for violent crime, espionage, terrorism and child exploitation.”