The appointment of Mr. Bongino means that two faithful allies of the American president will direct the main federal agency responsible for the application of the law in the country.
Donald Trump appointed Dan Bongino, conservative commentator and former secret service agent, as deputy director of the FBI.
The American president announced this appointment on Sunday to Monday to a message published on his social social platform, praising Mr. Bongino as “A man incredibly in love and passionate about our country”. He described this announcement as “Big news for the police and American justice”.
Mr. Bongino thanked Mr. Trump on X sharing the president’s original message. The 49-year-old will work under the direction of Kash Patel, director of the newly confirmed FBI, who was sworn in to the White House on Friday. The assistant function does not require confirmation by the Senate.
This places two faithful allies of D. Trump at the top of the main federal agency for maintaining the country’s order, while the Democrats fear that the president seeks to target his opponents.
Dan Bongino has served in several administrations including that of Barack Obama and George W. Bush, before becoming a popular right pundit. He has become one of the main personalities of the political movement “Make America Great Again” which broadcasts false information on the 2020 election.
The new deputy director of the FBI has no prior experience within the agency, which is unusual for a candidate for a high -level position. However, he worked for New York police from 1997 to 1999, before joining the secret services. He presented himself twice in the American Senate in Maryland and once in Florida between 2012 and 2016, in vain.
Mr. Bongino began to comment on Fox News over ten years ago, and participated in a Saturday evening program with the 2021 to 2023 channel. The Dan Bongino Showwhich is the 56th Podcast of the United States, according to Spotify. Mr. Trump said on Sunday that Mr. Bongino was “loan and willing to abandon “ The podcast “To serve”.
During an interview with his podcast before last year’s American elections, Mr. Bongino asked Trump to commit to forming a commission responsible for reforming the secret services, which he qualified as “Failure” and criticized following the two assassination attempts of last year.
In a more recent episode of his podcast, Mr. Bongino praised the appointment of Mr. Patel and criticized the Democrats who had opposed his appointment, saying that the new director was “There for only one reason: clean this place”.
Patel and Bongino will direct an FBI in full turns, the Ministry of Justice having recently ousted a group of senior officials and unusually requested the names of thousands of agents who participated in the surveys linked to the riot of January 6, 2021 at the Capitol of the United States.
The new director has expressed his wish to make major changes within the FBI, in particular by reducing his presence in Washington and putting more emphasis on traditional tasks of fighting crime rather than on collection work information that ended up defining his mandate.
Additional sources • AP
