WASHINGTON: The Federal Bureau of Investigation on Friday ordered the transfer of 1,500 staffers out of its Washington headquarters, two sources familiar with the orders told Reuters.
Some 1,000 of the staffers would be dispersed to field offices around the country, with another 500 ordered to transfer to Huntsville, Alabama, the sources said, adding that the news was conveyed to employees at a Friday meeting.
An FBI spokesperson did not have immediate comment.
The bureau had 9,414 employees in Washington as of June 2024, with 37,478 nationwide, according to figures kept by the federal government. FBI Director Kash Patel was sworn into his new role on Friday, the day after the Senate confirmed him as US President Donald Trump’s choice in a 51-49 vote with two Republicans voting no, expressing concern about Patel’s past political advocacy and its potential effect on the FBI’s law enforcement mission.
“I promise you the following: there will be accountability within the FBI and outside of the FBI, and we will do it through rigorous constitutional oversight starting this weekend,” Patel said after being sworn in. Patel takes charge as the Trump administration seeks to put their stamp on the FBI and its parent agency, the Justice Department, challenging decades-old traditions of independence and reorienting its mission toward Trump’s core priorities.
At least 75 career Justice Department lawyers and FBI officials, who normally keep their roles from administration to administration, have either resigned, been fired or stripped of their posts in the first month of the Trump administration.
Patel telegraphed his plans for the shakeup in his book “Government Gangsters,” where he proposed moving the FBI’s headquarters out of Washington D.C. to prevent “institutional capture and curb FBI leadership from engaging in political gamesmanship.”
Patel has said he will increase the FBI’s role in countering illegal immigration and violent crime, top Trump priorities, by “letting good cops be cops.” He has said he will scale back investigative work at the FBI’s Washington headquarters where many counterintelligence, national security and public corruption probes are housed.
The FBI has an office in Huntsville, Alabama at Redstone Arsenal, a US Army post that also houses Department of Defense and NASA offices.
Patel has been among the biggest boosters of claims that a “deep state” within the government has pursued Trump in an attempt to sink his political prospects.
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FBI to transfer 1,500 staffers out of Washington headquarters, two sources say
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FBI to transfer 1,500 staffers out of Washington headquarters, two sources say
- FBI Director Kash Patel was sworn into his new role on Friday
Australia Day protesters demand Indigenous rights
SYDNEY: Thousands of people rallied in cities across Australia demanding justice and rights for Indigenous peoples on Monday, a national holiday marking the 1788 arrival of a British fleet in Sydney Harbor.
Crowds took to the streets in Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra, Perth and other cities on Australia Day, many with banners proclaiming: “Always was, always will be Aboriginal land.”
In Sydney, police allowed the protests to go ahead despite new curbs introduced after gunmen opened fire on a Jewish Hanukkah festival on Bondi Beach on December 14, killing 15 people.
Millions of Australians celebrate the annual holiday with beers and backyard barbecues or a day by the sea, and this year a broad heatwave was forecast to push the temperature in South Australian capital Adelaide to 45C.
Shark sightings forced people out of the water at several beaches in and around Sydney, however, after a string of shark attacks in the region this month — including one that led to the death of a 12-year-old boy.
Many activists describe the January 26, 1788, British landing as “Invasion Day,” a moment that ushered in a period of oppression, lost lands, massacres and Indigenous children being removed from their families.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples make up about four percent of the population.
They still have a life expectancy eight years shorter than other Australians, higher rates of incarceration and deaths in custody, steeper youth unemployment and poorer education.
- Anti-immigration protests -
“Let’s celebrate on another day, because everyone loves this country and everyone wants to celebrate. But we don’t celebrate on a mourning day,” Indigenous man Kody Bardy, 44, told AFP in Sydney.
Another Indigenous protester in Sydney, 23-year-old Reeyah Dinah Lotoanie, called for people to recognize that a genocide happened in Australia.
“Ships still came to Sydney and decided to kill so many of our people,” she said.
Separately, thousands of people joined anti-immigration “March for Australia” protests in several cities, with police in Melbourne mobilizing to keep the two demonstrations apart.
In Sydney, “March for Australia” protesters chanted, “Send them back.” Some carried banners reading: “Stop importing terrorists” or “One flag, one country, one people.”
“There’s nowhere for people to live now, the hospitals are full, the roads are full, you’ve got people living on the streets,” said one demonstrator, 66-year-old Rick Conners.
Several also held aloft placards calling for the release of high-profile neo-Nazi Joel Davis, who is in custody after being arrested in November on allegations of threatening a federal lawmaker.
“There will be no tolerance for violence or hate speech on Sydney streets,” New South Wales Premier Chris Minns told reporters.
“We live in a beautiful, multicultural community with people from around the world, but we will not tolerate a situation where on Australia’s national day, it’s being pulled down by divisive language, hate speech or racism,” he said.
“Police are ready and willing to engage with people that breach those rules.”
Crowds took to the streets in Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra, Perth and other cities on Australia Day, many with banners proclaiming: “Always was, always will be Aboriginal land.”
In Sydney, police allowed the protests to go ahead despite new curbs introduced after gunmen opened fire on a Jewish Hanukkah festival on Bondi Beach on December 14, killing 15 people.
Millions of Australians celebrate the annual holiday with beers and backyard barbecues or a day by the sea, and this year a broad heatwave was forecast to push the temperature in South Australian capital Adelaide to 45C.
Shark sightings forced people out of the water at several beaches in and around Sydney, however, after a string of shark attacks in the region this month — including one that led to the death of a 12-year-old boy.
Many activists describe the January 26, 1788, British landing as “Invasion Day,” a moment that ushered in a period of oppression, lost lands, massacres and Indigenous children being removed from their families.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples make up about four percent of the population.
They still have a life expectancy eight years shorter than other Australians, higher rates of incarceration and deaths in custody, steeper youth unemployment and poorer education.
- Anti-immigration protests -
“Let’s celebrate on another day, because everyone loves this country and everyone wants to celebrate. But we don’t celebrate on a mourning day,” Indigenous man Kody Bardy, 44, told AFP in Sydney.
Another Indigenous protester in Sydney, 23-year-old Reeyah Dinah Lotoanie, called for people to recognize that a genocide happened in Australia.
“Ships still came to Sydney and decided to kill so many of our people,” she said.
Separately, thousands of people joined anti-immigration “March for Australia” protests in several cities, with police in Melbourne mobilizing to keep the two demonstrations apart.
In Sydney, “March for Australia” protesters chanted, “Send them back.” Some carried banners reading: “Stop importing terrorists” or “One flag, one country, one people.”
“There’s nowhere for people to live now, the hospitals are full, the roads are full, you’ve got people living on the streets,” said one demonstrator, 66-year-old Rick Conners.
Several also held aloft placards calling for the release of high-profile neo-Nazi Joel Davis, who is in custody after being arrested in November on allegations of threatening a federal lawmaker.
“There will be no tolerance for violence or hate speech on Sydney streets,” New South Wales Premier Chris Minns told reporters.
“We live in a beautiful, multicultural community with people from around the world, but we will not tolerate a situation where on Australia’s national day, it’s being pulled down by divisive language, hate speech or racism,” he said.
“Police are ready and willing to engage with people that breach those rules.”
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