On Tuesday morning, FBI Director Kash Patel used social media to push a familiar boast.
“This FBI has had historic success manhunting Ten Most Wanted fugitives,” the former podcast personality wrote. “Since the start of the Trump administration, we’ve captured TEN of the Top Ten Most Wanted, 2.5 times the number of TMW [the Ten Most Wanted] fugitives captured during the previous four years combined.”
Hours later, Patel appeared on Fox News, where Sean Hannity repeated the claim, and the FBI director accepted the host’s congratulatory message.
To be sure, it’s obviously good news when federal law enforcement personnel take the nation’s most wanted suspects into custody. But as Patel echoes a boast he has made before, there’s a relevant detail that shouldn’t go overlooked.
MS NOW’s Carol Leonnig and Ken Dilanian reported in May:
Patel’s FBI has imposed new policies that inflate these numbers and overstate the bureau’s progress in stemming crime, according to a half dozen law enforcement sources with knowledge of the changes. […]
An MS NOW review of changes in the FBI’s Most Wanted list during Patel’s tenure also found that the FBI manipulated that iconic bureau program to falsely suggest rapid progress; in that time, the bureau quickly added the names of some fugitives just hours or days before agents capture them.
In other words, the process, at least in some instances, has unfolded like this:
1. The FBI knows it’s about to apprehend a criminal suspect.
2. The FBI quickly adds that suspect to the Most Wanted List.
3. The FBI takes that suspect into custody.
4. Patel brags about his track record on arresting those on the Most Wanted List.
In one especially striking example, agents apprehended one suspect just one hour and 13 minutes after FBI leadership placed him on the list.
The bureau denied the accuracy of the reporting at the time, though MS NOW quoted one FBI official who conceded, “They are literally just nominating people they’re about to arrest or that they have solid information on and can affect arrest. Gone are the days of nominating the worst of the worst and fugitives that we haven’t been able to find.”
Another former official with the bureau added, “There has always been a bit of gaming of the ‘Top 10,’ but it’s a whole new level under this leadership.”
None of this came up during Patel’s latest Fox News appearance. But if the director is going to keep using this talking point, it’s a detail worth remembering.
The post Patel boasts about success rate on FBI’s Most Wanted list, but there’s a catch appeared first on MS NOW.
