Kash Patel Let His Cronies Skip a Crucial Security Step

Kash Patel allowed a radio host conspiracy theorist to fill the number two spot at the FBI without first passing a polygraph test.

Deputy Director Dan Bongino reportedly received a waiver for a polygraph test, according to four people who spoke anonymously with ProPublica Friday.

Typically, polygraph tests are required to establish approval for the “Top Secret” security clearances necessary to work at the agency. Recipients are asked questions about their criminal history, drug use, foreign contacts, and any mishandling of sensitive documents. Their results are used to determine whether they can have access to classified information.

It seems that Bongino may not have been asked about any of this, and yet, as deputy director, he has access to a trove of sensitive information, including the President’s Daily Brief, that collates essential information from the intelligence community. He is also responsible for day-to-day operations at the FBI and green-lighting surveillance operations.

Those familiar with Bongino’s rise to deputy director, after he had no prior experience at the agency, said issuing him a waiver was unprecedented. Multiple former FBI officials told ProPublica that they could not recall a single instance where a top-ranking official such as Bongino had received a waiver for a polygraph test, or anyone who had failed one.

Bongino and two other top-ranking officials reportedly received waivers from Patel.

In a statement to ProPublica, FBI spokesperson Ben Williamson said: “It is false that the individuals you referenced failed polygraphs.”

“The FBI follows all laws and procedures on personnel security measures, and any implication otherwise is false,” Williamson wrote. “Furthermore, while the FBI does not comment on confidential security information, particularly in matters of personnel, this article is riddled with falsehoods—it misrepresents polygraph protocol, inaccurately portrays FBI security measures, and makes multiple false claims about FBI employees who have done nothing wrong.”

The spokesperson also claimed that polygraphs were “not required” for political appointees at the agency. But several experts, including Daniel Meyer, a former executive director for the inspector general of the Intelligence Community External Review Panel, and three other lawyers specializing in national security told ProPublica that those Schedule C employees would not typically be excluded from the tests.

A former senior FBI official told ProPublica that while the existence of the waiver may suggest Bongino did not pass the polygraph test, it was possible he received a preemptive exemption. The outlet could not determine whether Bongino sat for a polygraph test.

Michael Flynn is seeking restitution from the government to the tune of $50 million.

Donald Trump’s onetime national security adviser is now negotiating a settlement with his Department of Justice, claiming that he was unjustly prosecuted by former special counsel Robert Mueller for lying to the FBI about conversations with a Russian official. Flynn initially pleaded guilty and then fought the prosecution, eventually receiving a pardon from Trump in 2020.

Flynn later filed a lawsuit against the government for damages, only to have a federal judge dismiss the case in December last year. While the Biden administration fought Flynn’s case, the Trump administration seems open to a settlement.

The move mirrors Trump’s attempt to get $240 million from the DOJ to settle his own claims of politically motivated prosecution. Flynn notoriously lasted only 22 days as Trump’s first national security adviser in 2017, resigning over his conversations with the Russian ambassador to the U.S. at the time, Sergey Kislyak.

Since then, Flynn has been one of the leading evangelists of the QAnon conspiracy theory and has also pushed Christian nationalism. If he actually gets his hefty settlement (with Trump’s approval), it’ll show that he’s still friendly with the president and the Republican Party, leaving the door open for conspiracy theorists to push their agenda.

On Friday, Rashida Tlaib and 20 other members of Congress put forth a resolution to recognize “the genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza,” something the United States has consistently refused to do, even in the face of U.N. evidence.

“Under the Genocide Convention,” the resolution reads, “the crime of genocide is committed when one or more categories of underlying acts are committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group as such, namely—(1) killing members of the group; (2) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (3) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; (4) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; or (5) forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.” 

It continues: “The overwhelming evidence is clear that the State of Israel has committed acts …  within the scope of the Genocide Convention against Palestinians in Gaza, including by—(1) killing members of the group; (2) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (3) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; and (4) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group.” 

The resolution goes on to note that Israel has killed “at least 67,160 Palestinians in Gaza, the majority of whom are women and children, since October 2023” and that 83 percent of them were civilians. It also highlights the Israeli military killing at least 250 journalists and at least 543 aid workers from the United Nations, Doctors Without Borders, World Central Kitchen, and the Palestine Red Crescent Society.

Israel has wounded at least 169,679 Palestinians in Gaza, “creating the largest cohort of child amputees in modern history,” the resolution continues. It also mentions that 500 schools, every university, 53 cultural sites, and 92 percent of all residential buildings have been destroyed by Israel. 

The signees make a point to note that Israel’s genocide has been largely bankrolled by the U.S. government and the American taxpayer, stating that “the United States provided an estimated $21,700,000,000 in military aid to Israel, and during that same period, the White House authorized or notified over $30,000,000,000 in additional new arms sales agreements to be paid for and delivered in future years.”

The resolution also focuses on the genocidal language employed by Israeli leaders, quoting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, and Maj. Gen. Aharon Haliva. 

“‘Remember what Amalek did to you. We remember and we fight,’” the resolution said, quoting Netanyahu. “[This is] a reference to the Book of Samuel, in which God tells the Israelites, ‘Now go and attack Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have; do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey,’ rhetoric that has since been repeatedly echoed by other government officials.

“‘It does not matter if they are children. I’m not speaking out of revenge. I’m talking about a message for future generations. From time to time, they need a Nakba to feel the cost’, referring to the violent ethnic cleansing of over 750,000 Palestinians from their homes and homeland by Zionist militias and the Israeli army during the establishment of the State of Israel in 1947 to 1949,” the resolution read, quoting Haliva. 

The tide of public opinion is shifting on Israel perhaps more than ever. But while this resolution is as strong a statement as we’ve gotten from congressional officials since the genocide began, there is little to suggest that it will pass the GOP-controlled House. 

Here are the representatives—all Democrats—who signed on anyway:

1. Rashida Tlaib—Michigan
2. André Carson—Indiana
3. Becca Balint—Vermont
4. Gregorio Casar—Texas
5. Maxwell Frost—Florida
6. Maxine Dexter—Oregon
7. Chuy Garcia—Illinois
8. Al Green—Texas
9. Pramila Jayapal—Washington
10. Hank Johnson—Georgia
11. Ro Khanna—California
12. Summer Lee—Pennsylvania
13. Jim McGovern—Massachusetts 
14. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez—New York
15. Ilhan Omar—Minnesota 
16. Ayana Pressley—Massachusetts
17. Mark Pocan—Wisconsin
18. Delia Ramirez—Illinois
19. Lateefah Simon—California
20. Nydia Velázquez—New York
21. Bonnie Watson Coleman—New Jersey

The recently ousted leader of the University of Virginia released a tell-all memo Friday on the DEI feud with Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin that cost him his job.

In a 12-page letter to the university’s Faculty Senate, former UVA President James E. Ryan detailed how Youngkin had mischaracterized the university’s decision regarding diversity, equity, and inclusion policies, landing it in hot water with the Trump administration and its overzealous Justice Department. The DOJ promised to “bleed UVA white” before Ryan resigned.

Ryan said his experience differed “in significant parts” from previous accounts, including from Youngkin and the school’s rector, Rachel Sheridan.

In March 2025, the school received a resolution, drafted by Youngkin’s office, on how it should handle DEI policies under Donald Trump’s second term. Ryan noted that it was the first such time that Youngkin had acted on the school’s behalf in his seven years atop the institution.

The school, however, did not adopt the resolution in full, according to Ryan. Instead, the resolution was whittled down to something that even the board’s Democratic appointees found palatable: the dissolution of UVA’s central DEI office and a reshuffling of permissible programs.

But that night, Youngkin went on Fox News with a very different message for the nation—claiming that the university board had done “something radical and sweeping” by declaring that “DEI is dead.”

“Dead” was a difficult term to decipher, according to Ryan, who noted that “it’s not clear even today what it means to kill DEI, and the governor didn’t go much beyond the soundbite.”

“For example, did it mean that we could no longer try to recruit qualified first-generation students from rural parts of Virginia, or offer financial aid, or even serve matzah in the dining halls during Passover, because each of those efforts would be advancing diversity, equity, and/or inclusion?” Ryan speculated.

While the parameters of Youngkin’s Trump-inspired DEI goals remained obfuscated, the Republican governor successfully set the University of Virginia up for failure.

The school did what it said it would do, in accordance with the agreed-upon resolution. Part of that involved a thorough review of the college’s many schools, which the school deemed would require more than the original 30-day allotted timeframe. It was Sheridan, who was then serving as chair of the board audit committee, who demanded that school officials with knowledge of the shifting DEI policies remain silent until the university board had a chance to meet.

That turned out to be a huge problem.

“Having to remain silent about our response to the Board resolution left us in a difficult position because our community was curious about the changes and what it might mean for them,” Ryan argued. “At the same time, external critics interpreted our silence as inaction. We explained to Board members that we were being placed in an untenable position, given that we could not implement any changes if we could not even discuss them publicly.

“We also pointed out that the Board had merely asked for an update, which implied that more work could still be done. But they nonetheless insisted that we remain quiet. So began the narrative that we were recalcitrant and resistant to any changes, which was not true but would continue up and through my forced resignation,” Ryan wrote.

Further still, Youngkin’s comments had created false expectations in the Trump administration as to how the university would navigate the DEI demands. Three weeks after the school submitted its update to the board in late April, the school received a letter from the Justice Department, inquiring why they had not complied with the board’s resolution, using language that was more aligned with Youngkin’s remarks on Fox News than the actual text of the approved memo.

“It was unclear, and still is, why the United States Department of Justice would have the interest or authority to enforce a resolution of the Board of a state university as opposed to enforcing federal law,” Ryan wrote.

In the ensuing months, a group of UVA alumni at the Justice Department took aim at their old school. Ryan recollects the school’s communications with this DOJ team, noting that “neither of the DOJ lawyers were fans of mine.” He also chronicles the process of compiling hundreds of pages’ worth of admissions data for the Justice Department—only to have the agency turn around and mischaracterize the school’s approved requests for extensions as attempts to “stall” the process.

“Why our own lawyers did not seem to understand or appreciate that submitting information in stages would be better than submitting nothing at all, especially given the false accusations that we were stonewalling, remains a mystery to me,” Ryan continued. “I do not know if they were exercising their independent judgment or receiving directions from a Board member and/or the Attorney General’s office.”

Ryan issued his letter a day after Sheridan penned her own account of the Trump administration–infused events leading to the university president’s ouster. The boiling drama adds another flair to tensions between Youngkin and his successor, Democratic Governor-elect Abigail Spanberger, who has questioned the Youngkin-appointed board’s influence over UVA’s ability to select Ryan’s replacement.

In a Friday post, the president has ordered the DOJ to jump into an investigation of Democrats in the Epstein emails, threatening us all with a good time.

President Donald Trump had another one of his patented social media meltdowns Friday morning as he demanded a federal investigation into any of the Democrats mentioned in recent emails released from Jeffrey Epstein’s estate. Never mind that dozens of those same emails also mentioned the convicted sex offender’s awkwardly close ties to the president himself.

Seemingly as payback for the Democrats using the “Epstein hoax, involving Democrats, not Republicans” to “deflect” from the longest government shutdown in U.S. history, Trump said that he would direct Attorney General Pam Bondi to look into Epstein’s ties to various Democrats mentioned in the trove of documents. The president’s list of targets would include former President Bill Clinton, former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, and LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman. (Trump also said the investigation would focus on J.P. Morgan and “Chase” as if the long-dead financier and the Chase Manhattan Bank of the 1950s were separate individuals.)

“This is another Russia, Russia, Russia Scam, with all arrows pointing to the Democrats. Records show that these men, and many others, spent large portions of their life with Epstein, and on his ‘Island,’” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social. (Epstein claimed multiple times in his emails that Clinton had never been to his home in the Virgin Islands.)

None of the documents released this week directly implicate Trump in any of Epstein’s alleged criminal activity, but they do directly suggest that Trump may have known about it, while fleshing out aspects of a relationship that seemed close—and to varying degrees salacious.

In emails released by Democrats, Epstein claimed that Trump “knew about the girls,” had spent hours in Epstein’s home with one of his victims, and called him the “dog that hasn’t barked.” In emails released by Republicans, Epstein suggested that he knew “how dirty Donald is,” said Trump didn’t have “one decent cell” in his body, and made multiple comments that suggested the two spent time together after he was in office.

Other prominent Republicans were also mentioned in the thousands of documents, including billionaire apocalypse prophet Peter Thiel and Trump’s former adviser Steve Bannon. In one email exchange with Epstein, Bannon said he couldn’t believe no one was making “the connective tissue” between Trump and Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s (then Prince Andrew) alleged sexual abuse of Virginia Giuffre. In another, Epstein gave Bannon advice on how to help Trump.

Clearly incensed by the recent reporting, Trump also shared a video clip from Fox News’s Jesse Watters Primetime to Truth Social, in which Watters lamented the Democrats’ “smear campaign disguised as a bombshell,” and claimed the only thing that the emails revealed was Trump’s “deep ties to liberals.”

Jeffrey Epstein’s email correspondence, released by the House Oversight Committee this week, implicates many powerful people, particularly President Trump. One email chain in particular seems to allude to Trump performing a lewd act.

The thread in question from March 2018 is between Epstein and his brother Mark, who asked the billionaire child sex offender, “What is your boy Donald up to now?” Epstein replied things were “all good” and that Steve Bannon, the president’s onetime adviser, was with him. Mark then emailed his brother, “Ask him if Putin has the photos of Trump blowing Bubba?”

The billionaire replied, “and i thought- I had tsuris,” using the Yiddish word for troubles. Mark’s reply then alludes to a prison movie: “You and your boy Donnie can make a remake of the movie Get Hard.”

Mark’s comment could either be a joke or a reference to an actual event. It’s not clear who Bubba is, but commentators on social media had a field day. Many noted that it is one of President Clinton’s nicknames, and Clinton also had a relationship with Epstein as well as Trump.

Is this real, or a disgusting joke between brothers? Trump has not directly addressed this email and has only taken shots at Clinton and others implicated in the released correspondence. The allusion to another piece of “kompromat” that Putin has over Trump seems to have irked the president, as he railed against another “Russia, Russia, Russia Scam” on Truth Social Friday morning.

With all of the sexual assault allegations against Epstein and Trump, the emails could point to something genuine. Regardless, the fact that the government has not yet released its full trove of Epstein files could mean that this is only the beginning.

MAGA Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene called fully releasing the Epstein files “the easiest thing in the world,” while accusing President Trump of “gaslighting” the American people.

The president continues to deny everything and unsuccessfully pressure other GOPers not to sign the House’s discharge petition. Greene sees Trump’s efforts to block the Epstein files and delegitimize his victims as a distraction from key issues like health care access and affordability.

“This is me wanting my party to do something, to win and do something good for the American people. It’s not me going against, it’s me pushing my party to say, this is what we need to be doing,” Greene told Politico. “Releasing the Epstein files is the easiest thing in the world.... Just release it all, let the American people sort through every bit of it, and, you know, support the victims. That’s just like the most common sense, easiest thing in the world. But to spend any effort trying to stop it makes—it just doesn’t make sense to me.”

In another interview Thursday evening, she even accused the president of “gaslighting” Americans about rising prices.

“President Trump and his administration [do] deserve a lot of credit for lowering inflation and holding it steady, but that doesn’t bring prices down. And so gaslighting the people and trying to tell them that prices have come down is not helping,” she said on The Sean Spicer Show.

MAGA’s most hard-line representative has now split with Trump on releasing the Epstein files, on health care access and inflation, and on foreign policy. Only time will tell if her heel turn remains true.

“I’m just speaking for myself, I’m America first. I am 100 percent for my country, no other country,” Greene continued. “That’s what a lot of people thought they voted for in 2024.... It’s a failure of our Republican majority in the House and the Republican majority in the Senate, if we aren’t legislating that way and making that happen.... I don’t see how we win the midterms on the course that we’ve been set on so far.”

Ellen Mei, a program specialist at USDA, was one of the thousands of federal employees who were furloughed during the record 43-day pause. But her time at the agency will soon come to a permanent close, all because she discussed the reality of SNAP benefits on MSNBC, reported The Washington Post.

The Trump administration walked back a pledge it made to continue funding the food assistance program, allowing the benefits to partially expire for more than 42 million Americans earlier this month. It did this despite the fact that the USDA had available funds that were specifically earmarked to cover the cost of SNAP during the shutdown.

Mei’s interview was no different from the dozens of others that she had participated in during her tenure as a government employee. Mei, who is also president of the National Treasury Employees Union for the Northeast division, told MSNBC on October 2 that she was speaking on behalf of herself and her union rather than the agriculture agency. Every detail she discussed with regard to SNAP and the shutdown was already publicly available information, either by way of news coverage, advocacy groups, or think tanks.

But the next day, Mei was notified by a USDA human resources representative that her employment would be terminated by the end of the month, and was accused of discussing the agency “without prior approval.” Mei interpreted the letter as retaliation for voicing her opinion on the machinations of the Trump administration.

“As I was and have been speaking in my personal capacity and in my capacity as union representative, I am not required to ask for permission to speak on behalf of me or my co-workers,” Mei told the Post. “Especially speaking on behalf of my co-workers as the union president, that is a right that I am granted by the Federal Labor Management statute. So I do not need to ask for permission.”

In a follow-up interview with MSNBC, Mei said she was “honestly really confused” by the termination notice.

“The New York Times and NPR had already published everything that I had said about SNAP and WIC,” Mei told the network, adding that some of what she discussed was also on the public-facing USDA website.

If you thought sending horrific, racist texts was enough to get you shunned from political service, think again! President Donald Trump wants Paul Ingrassia to take his “Nazi streak” to the General Services Administration.

In a Thursday email to his colleagues obtained by Politico, Ingrassia announced that the president had personally offered him a position as general counsel at the GSA. The conservative activist had previously been serving as White House liaison to the Department of Homeland Security.

Last month, Ingrassia withdrew his nomination for a position at the Office of Special Counsel, after his involvement in a racist text chain was discovered. His vile messages cost him critical support in the Senate, helping Trump set a record for having the most nominees withdrawn of any president.

In a normal world, this new job would be surprising considering the fact that Ingrassia revealed himself to be a deeply hateful and racist person. “No moulignon holidays.… From kwanza [sic] to mlk jr day to black history month to Juneteenth,” he wrote in one text, using an Italian slur for Black people in the beginning of the message. “Every single one needs to be eviscerated.”

“MLK Jr. was the 1960s George Floyd and his ‘holiday’ should be ended and tossed into the seventh circle of hell where it belongs,” he said in January. He also said he had a “bit of a Nazi streak” and to “never trust a chinaman or Indian. NEVER.”

Additionally, Ingrassia has also been accused of sexually harassing a co-worker, and he has sued Politico for reporting on those allegations.

Still, the Trump administration had nothing but good things to say about Ingrassia while confirming his move. A White House official said Ingrassia was “a very helpful addition to GSA and will successfully execute President Trump’s America First policies.” A spokesperson for GSA said they “look forward to having Paul Ingrassia’s legal talents help advance the GSA mission and the President’s priorities.”

Steve Bannon was receiving advice from Jeffrey Epstein as Bannon defended President Trump in media appearances in 2018, text messages released by the House Oversight Committee on Wednesday show.

From August 17 to August 23 of that year, the billionaire child sex offender coached Bannon on his messaging and TV appearances. In the released documents, Epstein’s email address is shown on an Apple iMessage account, while the other correspondent is redacted.

Context clues such as Fox News appearances, Bannon’s firing from the White House in 2017, and Bannon’s work on a documentary reveal that he is the other party in the conversation. It’s not clear whether the released messages are part of a larger conversation between Bannon and Epstein. The Guardian reached out to Bannon multiple times for comment but did not receive a reply.

The pair discussed breaking scandals, such as the Michael Cohen case, as well as Bannon’s TV appearances on MSNBC. At one point, Epstein offered compliments on how Bannon looked on TV, saying, “You looked so clean cut next to him i thought i turned on the figure skating channel by accident.”

Bannon responded with “My ‘come hither’ look,” to which Epstein replied, “Better than the usual ‘come hitler’ look.”

Epstein also helped Bannon come up with talking points to use in media appearances, telling him how to handle critics of Trump tax cuts.

“We can discuss response to tax cut criticism. The 83 percent to rich is misleading by miles . Cash back. Pension funds up,” texted Epstein, adding, “Corporations are not people. Giving corp breaks , is perceived as giving it to someone else. wage inflation cant be the first focus, the additional money in the system. First goes to hiring new people, only afterwards can wages rise.”

Other revealed messages show that Epstein advised Bannon during Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearing on what questions Christine Blasey Ford, who accused Kavanaugh of sexual assault, should be asked to undermine her credibility. Epstein suggested that Ford could be accused of taking medications that cause memory loss.

While Bannon doesn’t work directly for Trump, the pair still communicate and the president often reaches out to Bannon for advice, as was the case this past February before Trump’s disastrous meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. The release of these texts suggests that Bannon had a close relationship with Epstein, just like the president, and raises the question if all three collaborated on political business—or worse.