Bloomberg Law reported Tuesday that FBI Director Kash Patel is “planning to shrink his legal advisory office,” the FBI Office of General Counsel. Those are the folks whose job it is to keep Patel from carrying out corrupt and/or illegal activities. Or, as Bloomberg put it, the several hundred lawyers in the office are “responsible for advising top bureau executives and agents to ensure lawful investigations, responding to lawsuits against the FBI, and coordinating with Justice Department prosecutors on cases.” (All emphases in this post are mine.)
According to Bloomberg, the OGC was instructed to cut about 25% of its personnel “although that exact percentage is no longer considered a firm expectation.” Does that mean that more could be pushed out? Bloomberg doesn’t say. It does say that the OGC has been “pushing its workforce to take early retirement.”
Bloomberg goes on to quote retired FBI supervisory special agent Dan Brunner saying that the OGC personnel have been “vital in making sure that the agents conducting investigations were always within the guidelines.” Brunner also called FBI lawyers “incredibly important” and he said that any pushback against Patel is not personal but “because there are rules that potentially could be broken.”
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