President-elect Donald Trump's pick of Kash Patel as FBI director has drawn the ire of Democrats and some Republicans.
Trump announced the nomination Saturday evening on Truth Social, prompting a wave of responses from lawmakers across the political aisle, ranging from either vehement opposition or mild skepticism.
On Sunday, Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., told NBC News that over Thanksgiving, he received bomb threats and that he was "concerned" Patel would protect only Republicans.
Other Democrats expressing skepticism included Sen. Dick Durbin, the Senate's majority whip. According to CBS News, Durbin in a letter urged his colleagues to reject Patel.
"We already have a FBI director," Durbin wrote, adding the president-elect wants to "replace his own appointee with an unqualified loyalist." Trump appointed FBI Director Christopher Wray during his first term in office.
"The Senate should reject this unprecedented effort to weaponize the FBI for the campaign of retribution that Donald Trump has promised."
Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., told ABC News' "This Week" that he has no complaints about Wray and thinks Trump "picked a very good man to be the director of the FBI when he did that in his first term."
"The president has the right to make nominations, but normally these are for a 10-year term. We'll see what his process is, and whether he actually makes that nomination.
"And then, if he does, just as with anybody who is nominated for one of these positions, once they've been nominated by the president, then the president gets, you know, the benefit of the doubt on the nomination. But we still go through a process, and that process includes advice and consent, which for the Senate means advice or consent sometimes."
John Bolton, former national security adviser to Trump, compared Patel to Soviet Union leader Josef Stalin's head of secret police, Lavrentiy Beria, on CNN.
"Trump has nominated Kash Patel to be his Lavrentiy Beria. Fortunately, the FBI is not the NKVD [People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs]. The Senate should reject this nomination 100-0," Bolton said.
Vice President-elect JD Vance responded to Bolton's statement on X, writing: "John Bolton has been wrong about everything so I guess Kash must be pretty awesome."