- Kashyap ‘Kash’ Patel was born in New York in 1980 to Gujarati parents, who he said grew up in East Africa. He graduated from Garden City High School in Long Island.
- According to his Defense Department profile, Mr. Patel completed his undergraduate studies at the University of Richmond in the United Kingdom before returning to New York to pursue a law degree and certificate in International Law from the University College London Faculty of Law.
- Mr Patel, who grew up as a Hindu, said he had always had a “very deep” connection with India.
- Mr. Patel began his career as a public defender, litigating a variety of complex cases ranging from murder to narco-trafficking to complex financial crimes in jury trials in state and federal courts.
- He served as the former Chief of Staff to Acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller.
- He has served as Deputy Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Counterterrorism (CT) in the National Security Council (NSC). During this time, Mr. Patel oversaw the implementation of several top priorities of then US President Donald Trump, including eliminating ISIS and al-Qaeda leadership and the safe return of several American hostages.
- Kash Patel emerged as a controversial figure during Trump’s first term in the White House. He played a key role in leading House Republicans in the FBI’s 2016 investigation into contacts between Trump’s 2016 campaign and Russia during his tenure as an aide to former House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes.
- During Donald Trump’s first impeachment trial, former National Security Council official Fiona Hill told investigators that she was concerned Mr Patel was secretly running a back channel between Trump and Ukraine without permission, news agency Reuters reported. Were working as. However, Mr Patel had denied the allegations.
- After Trump left office in January 2021, Mr. Patel was one of several people the former president named as proxies for access to his presidential records.
- Mr. Patel has also served as National Security Advisor and Senior Counsel to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI).
