Kash Patel MELTS DOWN After FBI Bourbon Scandal EXPOSED

Added: 2026-05-14

[00:00:00]Cash Patel is out here handing out personalized whiskey bottles with an FBI shield stamped on them to federal employees and random civilians he meets while doing his job as FBI director.

[00:00:13]Eight sources confirmed it. The Atlantic bought the bottle on eBay. And when the FBI was asked to deny it, they didn't.

[00:00:21]They called it giftgiving that falls in line with ethics rules. And on the same day this story dropped, the FBI launched a criminal investigation into the journalist who wrote it, raided a Democratic state senator's office, and the Trump loyalist pushing hardest for that raid had already been thrown out by a judge for an unlawful appointment. All of that one morning, >> another bombshell report from The Atlantic about Donald Trump's embattled FBI director. Today, the magazine published this photo of quote cashel bourbon. The bottle, which The Atlantic purchased on eBay, also features a rendering of an FBI shield. The report says, quote, "Pattel has given out bottles of his personalized whiskey to FBI staff as well as civilians he encounters in his duties." That is according to eight people, including current and former FBI and Department of Justice employees and others who are familiar with the matter. In a statement to the magazine, an FBI spokesperson did not deny Patel hands out whiskey bottles with his name on it. Called this a form of gift giving that falls in line with the bureau's quote ethics rules. The whiskey scoop comes from Atlantic journalist Sarah Fitzpatrick. It is a followup to her reporting from last month, diving into Patel's controversial tenure as FBI director. The report comes on the same day. Two sources tell MS Now the FBI launched a criminal leak investigation into Fitzpatrick's reporting on Patel. Publicly, an FBI spokesperson denied such an investigation.

[00:01:54]Also today, the FBI raided the office of Virginia State Senator Luis Lucas this morning. She recently led Virginia's redistricting effort to counter Trump's push to rig the midterms. Details about that raid remain murky. We do know an investigation started under the Biden Justice Department, but over the course of the last three years, no charges have been filed. MS now also learned Trump lackey Lindseay Halligan had been pushing to bring charges in the case.

[00:02:22]That was before a judge removed Haligan as an intram US attorney, ruling her appointment was unlawful. So, all of the stories are connected here. Um, I will note that Cash Patel on April 10th for Sarah Fitzpatrick, she wrote a story on April 17th that starts with on April 10th, Cash Patel could not log into his FBI account. Essentially, he couldn't get into the system. And instead of thinking he just had the wrong password, he thought he was fired and started calling his allies. And people in the FBI then started calling the White House and Congress asking who is the FBI director if not Cash Patel. So, um I don't know if this is Balden Wells for his prospects, but Michael Alisia, they are they have been attacking our democracy from the beginning. They are actively trying to dismantle it. By they, I mean the White House, the current Republican party apparatus, and they are doing it in various ways.

[00:03:11]They're attacking the journalists and journalism. They are attacking um their quote unquote opponents, other dyeleed Democratic leaders. They are trafficking and sewing misinformation and disinformation. They don't want to answer any questions. We're gonna slippery slide >> dive into some crazy stuff.

[00:03:30]>> I hear you, Simone. But we got bourbon, >> so we're good. Uh that's I mean that's the level that we're at, folks. I mean Simone has laid out the indictment against not only this FBI a uh director and the agency itself, but this administration. And yet it boils down to actions like this uh where you just get your own little personal bottle of bourbon. I mean Alicia, [laughter] what what does that say about where we are here?

[00:03:59]>> It says we are deep deep into dysfunction. Um but that also we've we've known that this was all coming right that there they've actually told us that their plan was to go after all of the institutions that uphold our democracy. there was an actual playbook and now we are watching them run the play. So Simone, to your point, um, devastating, upsetting, um, but not surprising.

[00:04:25]>> Simone and I was trying to find in Project 2025 the section that said we need to get a personal bottle.

[00:04:31]>> Now that that I do believe was improvised, which you know, like kudos, I guess, to Cash Patel for trying to put his own spin on it >> all day. Why do they care about this story so much if they're saying that it's inaccurate? Uh now the way they might frame it is we're concerned that FBI officials are violating the media policy and making things up to reporters to impugn the reputation of the director. But that's the the rub here is that is this just Cash Patel using FBI resources to pursue leaks that essentially harmed his reputation that have nothing to do with national security or policy? That's the question that people are raising and it's a troubling one, Katie.

[00:05:06]>> Yeah. And here's >> we got bourbon so we're good. That was the actual response on air. And honestly, what else do you even say at that point? You've just laid out a complete unraveling of how a federal law enforcement agency is supposed to operate. A journalist being criminally probed, a Democratic official getting raided, and the FBI director treating the bureau like his personal merchandise store. And yeah, bourbon, we're fine.

[00:05:36]Everything is fine. But I want to stay on this whiskey thing for a second because I don't think people are fully grasping what this actually is. This is not Cash Patel bringing donuts to the office on a Friday. This is the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, one of the most powerful law enforcement positions in the entire country, putting his own name and an FBI shield on a bottle of alcohol and handing it out to people he encounters, including civilians, while performing his official duties. You know what that is? That's branding. That's Cash Patel using the weight and the imagery of a federal institution to build a personal identity around himself. The FBI shield is not his. That belongs to the American people. You don't get to slap it on your bourbon label because you happen to be sitting in the director's chair right now. And the spokesperson's response falls in line with ethics rules. Okay.

[00:06:37]So, the FBI has ethics rules about accepting gifts, right? There are strict federal regulations about government employees giving and receiving gifts.

[00:06:46]The whole framework exists to prevent exactly this kind of thing. Someone in power using their position to cultivate personal loyalty through material goods.

[00:06:57]But apparently when Cash Patel does it, it's fine. It's ethical giftgiving. The man is distributing branded alcohol with federal imagery to people who work for him and calling it compliance.

[00:07:10]Now, here's the part that reveals everything about how this regime operates. The Atlantic writes the story.

[00:07:17]Eight sources go on record. The FBI cannot deny the bottle exists because The Atlantic physically purchased it on eBay.

[00:07:27]So, what happens next? Instead of addressing the substance, instead of Cash Patel saying, "Yeah, I probably shouldn't have done that." The FBI opens a criminal leak investigation into Sarah Fitzpatrick, the journalist who broke the story. Think about the sequence there. Reporter writes story. Story is embarrassing. Agency investigates reporter. That's it. That's the whole thing. No national security concern. No classified information at the center of this. The story is about a bourbon bottle with his name on it. And the response is a criminal probe. Meanwhile, the FBI publicly denied the investigation existed. Two sources told MSNBC it was real and running. So, you've got an official denial and a simultaneous criminal investigation happening at the same time. The agency is lying about the existence of a probe at opened. That's where we are. And on the same morning all of this is happening, the FBI shows up at the office of Virginia State Senator Louise Lucas. She recently led Virginia's redistricting effort, which was specifically aimed at blocking Trump's push to gerrymander congressional maps ahead of the midterms. The investigation into her started under Biden. 3 years, no charges filed, nothing. But today, the day Cash Patel's bourbon story drops, suddenly it's time to raid her office. And the person who had been pushing hardest behind the scenes to actually bring charges against her, Lindseay Halligan, had already been removed by a federal judge who ruled her appointment as interim US attorney was unlawful. She was in that seat illegally. A court said so, and she was still driving prosecutorial decisions before she got thrown out. So, you've got an FBI director with a personal bourbon brand, a journalist criminally investigated for reporting on him, a Democratic state senator raided with no charges after 3 years, a Trump loyalist removed by a judge still shaping federal cases before her removal. All happening simultaneously, all on the same day. This is not coincidence. This is coordination.

[00:09:52]And before we get into the next clip, I need to tell you about the password situation because this is genuinely one of the most unhinged things I have heard about this man. On April 10th, Cash Patel could not log into his FBI computer account. Couldn't get in.

[00:10:11]Standard IT problem. Happens to everyone. And instead of thinking, okay, maybe I typed it wrong. Let me reset my password. He concluded he had been fired. He panicked, started calling his allies, and then people inside the FBI started calling the White House, started calling Congress, asking who the FBI director is if it's not Cash Patel. The entire apparatus got activated over a login screen. The man who runs the most powerful domestic law enforcement agency in the United States thought a locked account meant a coup.

[00:10:50]That is your FBI director. That is who has access to every surveillance tool, every investigative resource, every piece of intelligence infrastructure this country has built over decades. He couldn't log in and thought he got fired. If you're watching this and you haven't subscribed yet, tap it real quick. It actually helps more than you think.

[00:11:13]>> The thing, and Chris, I I don't need to point this out to you. Cash Patel has been on camera chugging beers. We all saw him chugging a beer uh in the locker room of the men's hockey team after the Olympics. So, reputational damage.

[00:11:28]How I don't even know what to ask on this. What do you think of the investigation?

[00:11:33]>> Listen, it's it's baseless. Uh it's a a clear abusive position. Uh you know, listen, every FBI agent and FBI employee swears an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. I did that both as a United States Marine and an FBI agent. Uh and to a person in the FBI, my teammates to the left and the right of me saw that as, you know, something that was their priority. You know, a belief in duty, honor, and country. And unfortunately, the director of the FBI right now doesn't believe in that. He believes in loyalty to the MAG movement and to to pus. Um, and you know, going after the press is a flagrant attack on one of our founding principles. Uh, as an FBI agent, you cannot open up investigations, you know, based on, you know, somebody's speech, uh, you know, their first, uh, you know, amendment protected rights. You can't go after the press. But none of those standards seem to matter anymore. and you know Cash Patel and other false patriots very conveniently shred the Constitution as quickly as they can when it is inconvenient for them when you know such you know granular reporting comes out about things that we're already seeing with our own eyes. If he doesn't want critics to continue to report on him, he should start acting like a a grown-up, like a professional, and like you would expect the director of the FBI to be.

[00:13:01]Let's talk about the pattern. In April, the New York Times reported the FBI began investigating one of its reporters for violating stalking laws. We covered this here on a story that um was about Cash Patel's girlfriend using FBI security resources. In January, the FBI conducted a court authorized and unprecedented search of the home of a Washington Post reporter Hannah Natinson uh seizing two computers, a recorder, a Garmin watch, a phone, and a portable hard drive. I believe she just won a high-profile prestigious journalism award. Um, and the FBI also launched an internal inquiry after former NBC News contributor, our friend here, Frank Figuzzi, made comments about Patel's alleged socializing and work habits last year on Morning Joe. A judge tossed Patel's defamation lawsuit. By the way, what about the pattern? I mean, that's three pretty specific examples of stories that were not um flattering for Cash Patel. And then suddenly these reporters are find themselves in the hot seat.

[00:14:05]>> Yeah. I think the issue is I mean this most recent example you know that Ken and Carol have reported on is just another data point of why he should not be the director of the FBI. He lacks the experience, the character, the maturity, the disposition, uh the the judgment uh to hold such an important position and the country is less safe every day that he's allowed to remain in that position.

[00:14:31]And I'll make one final point and Lisa can amplify it, I'm sure, but as an FBI agent, um I could not conduct investigations into what were clearly hate groups. Um because hate speech is not against the law. So, the most vile and uh objectively uh kind of violent speech is still protected by, you know, our our constitution or our bill of rights.

[00:14:58]We're not allowed to conduct investigations based solely on that. You cannot conduct investigations on the press based solely on their reporting.

[00:15:06]Um, and we're seeing the abuse of power and the weaponization of the FBI play out in front of us and it should alarm every American. And let me just be clear. Hannah Natinson had reported on the Trump administration's downsizing of the federal workforce. Uh the FBI search was part of an investigation into a government contractor who the Justice Department said had leaked her classified information. By the way, she just won a Pulitzer. That's the award I was uh I was referring to. Lisa, let's talk about the legal avenues a little bit more because the the Atlantic says they'll fight this. How far can the FBI go with a journalist with Sarah Fitzpatrick? Can they really just seize all of her materials and and be as intrusive as they can potentially or Ken was laying out? Um, legally speaking, or can The Atlantic get involved early and and get a judge to to stop this?

[00:15:56]>> You can't do it in a preventative way, but you can do, for example, what the Washington Post did in supporting Hannah Nathansson. You can ask for an order that prevents the government from using the things that they have seized pursuant to a search warrant. You can also file what's called a rule 41G motion. It's a motion for the return of property. But Katie, I want to point out something to you that is, I think, reflective or at least emblematic of the pattern that you were discussing. And that's an April 2025 memo by the now acting attorney general Todd Blanch that rescended a Garland era or Biden era policy about when you could subpoena the news media and involve them in these leak investigations. Ken was noting before that it didn't used to be the case that you would have a leak investigation about something that's non-classified, but under this new Todd Blanch memo from April of last year, you certainly can do that. And they say that the government will not tolerate, and I'm reading from the memo, unauthorized disclosures that undermine President Trump's policies, victimize government agencies, and cause harm to the American people where a government employee improperly discloses sensitive information for the purposes of personal.

[00:17:05]>> Okay, so that clip just walked through the pattern, and I want to build on that because the pattern is actually worse than what they described on air. Three reporters, three separate situations, all connected by one thing. They wrote something Cash Patel didn't like. The New York Times gets investigated after reporting on Cash Patel's girlfriend using FBI security resources for personal purposes. Government vehicles, government personnel being used to protect and accommodate someone who has no official federal role. That story runs and suddenly there's an FBI inquiry into the Times reporter for allegedly violating stalking laws. Four, journalism. Hannah Nathansson at the Washington Post writes about the Trump administration's dismantling of the federal workforce. The FBI shows up at her home, takes two computers, a recorder, a Garmin watch, a phone, a portable hard drive. They walked out of a journalist's house with her Garmin watch. She just won a Pulitzer Prize for that reporting. A Pulitzer, the journalism community's highest recognition. And Cash Patel's FBI raided her home. Frank Thigluzzi goes on Morning Joe and talks about Patel's alleged work habits and socializing.

[00:18:28]FBI opens an internal inquiry. Patel files a defamation lawsuit. A judge throws it out. Three reporters, three investigations or reigns or lawsuits.

[00:18:41]Zero charges, zero convictions, zero findings of wrongdoing, just pressure, intimidation. The message being sent is not subtle. You write about Cash Patel, you will find out what it feels like to have the full weight of federal law enforcement pointed at you personally.

[00:19:01]And the former FBI agent in that clip said something that I don't want to get lost. He said as an agent, he could not open investigations into hate groups because hate speech is constitutionally protected. Could not. Even when the speech was violent, vile, objectively dangerous, if it didn't cross into a legal action, the FBI could not open a file on it. That's how the system is supposed to work. First Amendment protection is not optional. It does not have an asterisk that says unless the FBI director is embarrassed. But Cash Patel is using the same investigative infrastructure to go after journalists who wrote accurate stories based on real sources. And the memo that Lisa Monaco, sorry, the memo that acting attorney general Todd Blanch put out in April 2025 is the thing that actually made all of this legal under this regime. or at least they're claiming it's legal. The Garland era policy had specific restrictions on when the Justice Department could subpoena journalists and involve them in leak investigations.

[00:20:08]There were protections. There were guard rails. Todd Blanch rescended all of it, wiped it, and replaced it with a memo that says the government will not tolerate, and these are their words, unauthorized disclosures that undermine President Trump's policies. Undermine President Trump's policies, not national security, not classified operations, not intelligence sources, Trump's policies.

[00:20:36]Meaning if you report something that makes his administration look bad and someone inside leaks that information to you, that leak is now a criminal matter under this framework. The press is not being given any meaningful protection anymore. The shield that has existed between journalists and federal prosecution has been deliberately removed by the people who are simultaneously being reported on. That is not an accident. That is the architecture of information control. You remove the legal protection. You open criminal probes. You raid homes. You seize equipment. You file defamation suits. And even when every single one of those things fails, even when judges throw out the lawsuits, even when no charges get filed, even when the Pulitzer Committee hands the reporter an award, the message has still been sent to every other journalist watching. This is what happens when you come for Cash Patel. And look, I want to talk about the Trump angle on this because I think it's important and I don't think it gets discussed enough. Donald Trump has a very specific relationship with personal branding inside his own administration.

[00:21:49]He is the brand. Everything is the Trump brand. The Kennedy Center, the ballroom, his face on the official passport cover.

[00:21:58]He is actively building monuments to himself while sitting in office. Arches, murals, his name on everything that can have a name on it. And that is exclusively his territory. His people do not get to do that. They serve him. They don't build themselves. So when Cash Patel shows up with a personalized bourbon bottle featuring federal imagery, that is a problem. Not just ethically, not just legally, but politically inside the dynamics of this White House. Trump does not share the spotlight. He does not allow the people around him to cultivate their own identities at the expense of his. The JD Vance memorial whatever does not exist.

[00:22:44]It will never exist because that's not how this works. You are a vehicle for Trump's brand. You are not allowed to have your own. And Patel, whether he understood it or not, started doing exactly that. Building a personal identity. Casual Bourbon, the FBI shield, his name on a product. His presence at hockey games, chugging beers on camera. He was becoming a character, a personality. And Trump cannot have that. The alcohol stuff compounds everything. Trump is famously anti-drinking. Doesn't drink himself.

[00:23:22]doesn't like it around him. When Pete Hegsth had his alcohol controversy before confirmation, it almost sank him.

[00:23:30]There were genuine questions about whether Trump would pull the nomination over it. Hegs survived and notably has not had a public alcohol incident since taking the job. He read the room. Cash Patel has not read the room. He's on camera chugging beers with the hockey team. He's got his name on a whiskey bottle. And now eight sources are telling The Atlantic he may have shown up to work impaired.

[00:23:59]Eight sources, current and former FBI employees, people who were in the building. And when The Atlantic asks the FBI to deny it, they talk about ethics compliance instead of just saying that's false. That non-denial is doing a lot of work. Here's what I think is actually happening. Patel is running out of runway. Not because of the bourbon bottle specifically, not because of any one story, but because the accumulation of all of it, the login panic, the branded alcohol, the journalist investigations, the raid on the same day his story drops, the defamation lawsuit that got tossed, the girlfriend using FBI security resources, the drinking allegations, all of it together is building a portrait of someone who is using a federal institution. ution as a personal operation and the people inside the FBI.

[00:24:57]The career agents who swore an oath to the Constitution who cannot investigate hate groups because of First Amendment protections, who have actual professional standards they've operated under for decades. Those people are the ones talking to reporters. Eight of them went to the Atlantic. former agents are going on cable news and saying the country is less safe every day he stays in that job. These are not Democratic operatives. These are law enforcement professionals who watch someone come in and treat their institution like a personal branding exercise. The criminal leak investigation into Sarah Fitzpatrick is in a dark irony. Probably the thing that guarantees this story does not go away. The Atlantic has already said they'll fight it. Fighting it means court filings. Court filings mean discovery. Discovery means documents. And documents mean a public record of exactly what the FBI did and why they did it in response to a story about a bourbon bottle. Cash Patel going after the journalist is the thing that keeps this alive. If he had just said nothing, let the story die, moved on, maybe it fades. But opening a criminal probe, raiding an office on the same morning, that's not a news cycle killer.

[00:26:19]That's a sequel. The Todd Blanch memo is the piece of this that actually scares me the most, though, because Patel is temporary. Whatever happens to him, fired, resigned, marginalized, the memo stays, the policy stays. The framework that says you can now open leak investigations into journalists over non-classified information that undermines Trump's policies. That does not go away when Cash Patel goes away.

[00:26:50]That is now the operating standard for how this Justice Department approaches the press. Every reporter covering this administration is now operating under a legal framework specifically designed to criminalize their sources. Every editor deciding whether to publish a sensitive story has to calculate the risk of a federal raid on their journalist's home.

[00:27:13]Every source inside the government who sees something wrong and wants the public to know has to weigh whether talking to a reporter could result in a criminal referral. That's the chilling effect. And it's not accidental. It's the point. The bourbon bottle is almost a metaphor for the whole thing. Cash Patel put his name on something that belongs to the American people, the FBI shield, and started distributing it as though it were his personal property.

[00:27:44]That's what this entire apparatus has been doing since January 20th. taking institutions that belong to the public, stamping their name on them, and using them for personal and political purposes.

[00:27:58]The agents who swore an oath to the Constitution, they know what they signed up to protect. And the fact that eight of them went to the Atlantic, that former agents are going on television, that people inside the building are talking, tells you something about the level of institutional rot that career professionals inside that agency are watching happen in real time. Cash Patel cannot log into his computer without thinking he's been fired. Cash Patel cannot handle a critical article without opening a criminal probe. Cash Patel cannot show up to a hockey game without chugging beers on camera. Cash Patel cannot be FBI director without putting his name on a whiskey bottle with a federal seal on it. And yet, here we are. He's still in that chair for now.

[00:28:51]There you have it. Hope you got something out of this one because this story has a lot of layers and I feel like most people are just seeing the bourbon headline and moving on. The Todd Blanch memo, the journalist raids, the raid on Louise Lucas the same morning.

[00:29:08]That's the real story underneath the bottle. If you're not subscribed yet, it's one tap and it genuinely does help this channel keep going. No pressure either way. Drop a comment if you've been following the Patel situation because I feel like this one is far from over. Glad you watched. See you in the next one.