Exclusive: Patel tells Just the News the FBI is 'faster, stronger, more accountable' after reforms

FBI Director Kash Patel on Wednesday told Just the News his team has implemented a dozen major reforms that have made the bureau "faster, stronger, more accountable" than the one he inherited earlier this year and that agents are getting new tools that will allow them to better counter terror threats from drones and use artificial intelligence to more quickly detect crimes.

"The results are already clear: historic crime reductions, major disruptions to criminal networks and record arrests across violent crime, espionage, terrorism, and child exploitation. This is the FBI doing exactly what it’s supposed to do," Patel said in a statement.

Patel and Deputy Director Dan Bongino went on the offensive this week to counter anonymous complaints published by news media – including New York Post columnist Miranda Devine – from former employees alleging the bureau is suffering from systemic problems and is "rudderless."

Bongino directly criticized Devine's report in a post on X, calling her "deep-state Devine."

"You can always count on Miranda for a timed hit piece when the director and I make big changes," he wrote. "Miranda prefers the old-guard. I don’t. Full steam ahead."

Devine, a favorite columnist of President Donald Trump whose work on Hunter Biden's laptop led to a best-selling book, fired right back.

"Anonymous sources do not 'always lie,'" she wrote on X. "They are often the only way to expose corruption and abuse and bring accountability to the powerful. Multiple brave whistleblowers came forward to Sen. Grassley under Biden to expose wrongdoing at the FBI, for instance."

In a statement to Just the News, Bongino said the complaints from the anonymous sources were predictable because there are elements in the bureaucracy that don't want to change the status quo.

"When the director and I made these reforms, we knew a small group of disgruntled former agents, vestiges of the Comey-Wray era, would complain," Bongino said. "We don’t work for them. We work for the American people. The new leadership team is delivering in ways this bureau hasn’t seen in decades: stronger results, better accountability, billions saved for taxpayers, and a renewed focus on the mission. This is what rebuilding trust looks like."

Bongino also published a lengthy statement on X on Wednesday identifying several new policies and changes the bureau has implemented, and Patel told Just the News those reforms had clear goals.

"The reforms we put in place this year were designed for one purpose: to make the FBI faster, stronger, more accountable and relentlessly focused on protecting Americans," he explained. "We reorganized the Bureau for efficiency, moved agents from D.C. back into the field, launched new national security tools including our counter-drone school, streamlined FOIA, and cut billions in wasted spending."

According to Bongino, the new policies and reforms include:

• Significantly changing the FBI leaders in Washington D.C., some of whom Bongino said "have upset a group of Comey-Wray era disgruntled former agents who prefer the old ways of operating."
• Developing new artificial intelligence tools "to assist our investigators and analysts in the national security space" and detect threats and crimes quicker.
• Saving billions of dollars saved by scrapping a plan for a new FBI headquarters building, instead moving into unused space in the . Ronald Reagan federal building
• Moving FBI personnel out of the Washington DC area and into  field offices to "focus on violent crime, crimes against children, and terrorism."
• Launching the FBI’s first-ever counter-drone schooto help the bureau better future terrorism threats from the sky.
• Eliminating Diversity, Equity and Inclusion policies, reforming the agent's physical fitness test, and making promotions contingent on merit.
• Severing ties with the left-elaning groups like the Southern Poverty Law Center.
• Dedicating significant personnel and financial assets to streamline open records requests.
• Shutting down multiple open-air drug markets nationwide and, in conjunction with the White House, getting 12 fentanyl precursors from China listed.
• Terminating duplicative and wasteful contracts.
• Expanding an overseas biometrics program to stop bad actors before they board a plane or vessel coming to the United States