Grassley pushes for Senate committee vote on Patel as early as next week

Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said he’s eyeing next week for a final committee vote on Kash Patel’s nomination to lead the FBI, rejecting Senate Democrats’ request for a second formal hearing with the nominee.

“Further hearings on his nomination are unnecessary,” Grassley said in a statement Tuesday.

Grassley said Patel already testified for more than five hours before the committee, shared “thousands of pages of records and media appearances,” and provided 147 pages of answers to senators’ written questions.

“The Senate Judiciary Committee will not fall for Democrats’ delay tactics,” Grassley added. “I intend to hold a final committee vote on Patel’s nomination as soon as next week.”

Earlier on Tuesday, Senate Democrats on the committee wrote to Grassley to ask him to hold a second hearing for Patel. They said they wanted Patel to “clarify apparent falsehoods in his testimony” during the first hearing and wanted time to assess Patel’s grand jury testimony in connection to the federal investigation into President Trump’s retention of classified documents.

They also said they wanted Patel to address “the recent removals and reassignments of FBI career civil servants.”

“No one was convinced by the Minority’s baseless efforts to mischaracterize and malign Kash Patel,” Grassley said. “It’s additionally outrageous to assert that a nominee should come before the Senate to answer for government actions that occurred prior to their time at an agency.”