Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) announced that he will vote to confirm Kash Patel, President Trump’s choice to lead the FBI.
Cassidy, the chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, said on Tuesday that he talked to “multiple people I respect about Kash Patel this weekend—both for and against.”
“The ones who worked closely with Kash vouched for him. I will vote for his confirmation,” he wrote Tuesday on X.
Patel’s newfound support from the GOP senator comes as the chamber gets ready to vote on his formal confirmation later this week.
On Tuesday, the Senate advanced Patel’s nomination with a 48-45 party-line vote, bringing him one step closer to being confirmed and leading an agency that Republican lawmakers have accused of being weaponized “against the American people” and marred with politics. A couple of senators did not vote.
Patel, a former House staffer who held several national security posts during Trump’s first term, was advanced out of the Senate Judiciary Committee with a 12-10 vote on Thursday last week.
The nominee has come under heavy scrutiny from Democrats over his previous comments from which he appeared to distance himself from during the last month’s hearing.
Republicans have defended Patel, arguing he would restore trust in the FBI and that throughout his career he has fought “for righteous causes.”
“He’s been a public defender, representing the accused against the power of the state. He’s been a congressional staffer investigating the partisan weaponization of our legal system, and he served in key national security roles, protecting Americans from foreign enemies,” Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said earlier this month.
Republican Sens. Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) and Susan Collins (Maine) have not said whether they will vote to confirm Patel.
Both have voted against Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth who eventually was confirmed via a tiebreaker vote.
Collins told CNN that she is looking at “additional material from the hearing” Tuesday night before deciding who she will vote on the nominee.
