Kash Patel, the chief of staff to the Acting United States Secretary of Defense under President Donald Trump, told Epoch Times host Jan Jekielek that on Jan. 4, 5, and 6 he was on the phone with President Trump, then-Chief-of-Staff Mark Meadows and the Department of Homeland Security to discuss security around the Capitol, but Wray was noticeably absent from those phone calls even though his participation was requested, and it was in the FBI’s purview to help keep the Capitol safe.
Patel told Jekielek that the Department of Defense had offered to send thousands National Guard troops to D.C. to quell any potential violence, but Mayor Bowser had rejected the offer for what he believed were political reasons.
He explained that although it is the job of law enforcement to protect the nation’s Capitol, National Guard troops could have been deployed to assist their “law enforcement partners” through a request from the mayor, the governor, or Capitol Police.
“That’s what should have happened, and that’s what we told them they might want to consider,” Patel said. “But they flat-out rejected.” The former Trump official also pointed out that the FBI should have briefed Cabinet officials on whatever intelligence they had surrounding the Jan. 6 event, and could have stationed up to a thousand uniformed agents around the Capitol, but didn’t. Additionally, he argued, a temporary fence could have been put up to protect the Capitol building during the protest, but it was not.
Patel told Jekielek that mistakes were made that were “intentional or otherwise,” and that’s what led to the January 6 fiasco.
“If you look at the videos from January 6—and they still won’t release all of it—an entire side of the Capitol, I believe it’s the South side—was totally unmanned. No police officers whatsoever. And that’s where the crowd first came in through, Patel said. “You have to ask yourself —what happened on January 6?”
After the riot, Patel said, he had the Secretary of Defense, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Secretary of the Army create a written timeline detailing actions that were taken in the days before, during and after the riot so that “the American people and Congress would have an actual tick-tock” signed off on by these three important leaders.
He stressed that President Trump authorized 10-20 thousand National Guard troops from around the country to be stationed at the Capitol, but that the DoD still needed a request from the local government to deploy them.
“When they went to them, they were told they weren’t needed,” Patel said. “Those actions have been overlooked by too many.
He continued: “Those congressional inquiries they’re doing, they purposely don’t want to look at what actually happened because the incident could have been prevented, it should never have happened, and it was a failure of law enforcement on that day—mostly of the FBI.”
Patel also pointed out that it was widely know that there was a potential for violence during the protest on January 6.
“It’s not like this was classified,” he said. “Starbucks and Dunkin Donuts were all closed. They were all boarded up on January 6. It’s not like they had better information than the Federal Bureau of Investigation who is responsible for domestic intelligence. People had an idea that something bad could happen.”
Patel argued that if there had been uniformed FBI, and DHS agents on the ground, and they had built a wall around the Capitol prior to January 6, “this event could have been avoided.”
“They totally failed, 100 percent,” he declared. “I think it was a total, total failure on law enforcement on that day.”
“I was on the phone calls on January 4th, 5th, and 6th with the president, the Chief-of-Staff, with the attorney general, with the Department of Homeland Security, and the only person missing from those phone calls was the director of the FBI. He was nowhere to be found.”
Patel reiterated that he was in constant communication with all of these top officials, but the one person who was “noticeably absent even upon request” was Wray.
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