WASHINGTON – Dan Bongino, a former U.S. Secret Service agent who has penned best-selling books, ran unsuccessfully for workplace and gained fame as a conservative pundit with TV exhibits and a well-liked podcast, has been chosen to function FBI deputy director.
President Donald Trump introduced the appointment Sunday evening in a publish on his Reality Social platform, praising Bongino as “a person of unbelievable love and keenness for our Nation.” He referred to as the announcement “nice information for Regulation Enforcement and American Justice.”
The choice locations two staunch Trump allies atop the nation’s premier federal regulation enforcement company at a time when Democrats are involved that the president might search to focus on his adversaries. Bongino would serve underneath Kash Patel, who was sworn in as FBI director at the White House on Friday and who has signaled his intent to reshape the bureau, together with by relocating a whole lot of staff from its Washington headquarters and putting better emphasis on the FBI’s conventional crime-fighting duties.
The deputy director serves because the FBI’s second-in-command and is historically a profession agent liable for the bureau’s day-to-day regulation enforcement operations.
Bongino, 49, served on the presidential particulars for then-Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush, earlier than turning into a well-liked right-wing determine. He grew to become one of many main personalities within the Make America Nice Once more political motion to unfold false details about the 2020 election.
For a couple of years following Rush Limbaugh’s dying in 2021, he was chosen for a radio show on the identical time slot of the well-known commentator.
Bongino labored for the New York Police Division from 1997 via 1999, earlier than becoming a member of the Secret Service. He started doing commentary on Fox Information greater than a decade in the past, and had a Saturday evening present with the community from 2021 to 2023. He’s now a bunch of The Dan Bongino Present, one of the vital common podcasts, in response to Spotify.
Bongino ran for a U.S. Senate seat in Maryland in 2012 and for congressional seats in 2014 and 2016 in Maryland and Florida, after transferring in 2015. He misplaced the three races.
Throughout an interview final fall, Bongino requested Trump to decide to forming a fee to reform the Secret Service, calling it a “failed” company and criticizing it for the two assassination attempts final 12 months.
“That man ought to have been nowhere close to you,” Bongino stated concerning the man who authorities say camped exterior Trump’s golf course in West Palm Seaside, Florida, earlier than he was noticed with a rifle.
Throughout the identical interview, Trump praised the Secret Service agent who noticed the rifle’s barrel popping out of a bush.
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Related Press author Ali Swenson in New York contributed to this report.
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