Patel, a Trump loyalist who during the president's first term advised both the director of national intelligence and the secretary of defense, has previously called for stripping the FBI of its intelligence-gathering role and purging its ranks of any employee who refuses to support Trump's agenda.

The FBI searched multiple properties on Thursday in a widening probe into an Afghan national suspected in the shooting of two National Guard members, an attack that drew accusations from the Trump administration of Biden-era immigration vetting failures and prompted a sweeping review of asylum cases.