FBI

'We Are Not Into Bestiality,' FBI Director Kash Patel Tells Members of Congress

Wait, what?

Elizabeth Nolan Brown | 9.16.2026 11:25 AM

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(Bill Clark CQ Roll Call/Newscom/Adani Samat/Envato)

"We are not into bestiality," FBI Director Kash Patel told members of Congress yesterday, moments after assuring them that they were "not going to disqualify" any of the agency's "great canines" for engaging in sexual activity with FBI agents.

I'm sorry—what?

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After watching this exchange from the hearing, I wondered for a moment if journalist Aaron Ruper, who had shared the clip, hadn't been taken in somehow by a deepfake.

But no, it's real. And as far as I can tell, it's not actually a defense of human-to-canine coupling, thank goodness. It's just Patel handling questions about recent FBI policy changes in pretty much the worst way possible.

Let's back up a moment. In August, the Associated Press reported that the FBI would no longer bar the hiring of agents who had paid for sex—with a human, I guess I should clarify—in the past. "The move away from an automatic disqualification falls along a continuum of evolving recruitment standards within federal law enforcement and at the buttoned-up bureau, which several years ago relaxed its approach to candidates' past marijuana use," noted the A.P. "The bureau still intends to dismiss applicants who are revealed during the vetting process to have engaged in prostitution within the last 10 years, three or more times overall or while in a position of trust such as public safety," according to an A.P. source who "spoke on condition of anonymity."

The FBI has a long history of arresting people who pay for sexual activity and people who sell it, so I greeted the policy change with a hearty eye roll. But it's probably no big deal. The agency isn't saying it........

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