// WIRED US/UK — MONDO
The FBI Doubles Down on Easing ‘Bestiality’ Hiring Standards
Kash Patel, director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, told confused members of the Senate judiciary committee on Thursday that new FBI hiring standards are aimed at protecting “victims of bestiality.”
Prior to the current administration, FBI policy was to bar applicants who had, among other things, hired sex workers, stolen from an employer, or engaged in bestiality. In August, CBS News reported that these standards had been relaxed and that multiple sources claimed “the FBI did so to facilitate hiring in some cases.”
According to a letter from Senate Democrats to Patel, new standards appear to have been quietly enacted as early as February 2025. They now allow for the hiring of someone who, for example, stole from an employer more than three years ago, or “paid for sex fewer than three times more than 10 years ago”—traditionally disqualifying because it carries blackmail risk—as long as they weren’t in a position of “public trust.”
But one change has captured more attention than the rest: A “history of bestiality or animal cruelty,” according to the letter, “is not automatically disqualifying under this new policy either, so long as the conduct occurred before the applicant turned 18.”
“You dropped automatic disqualification for applicants who have been engaged in bestiality,” said Senator Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat, during an oversight hearing Thursday. “Not victims of bestiality, applicants who have been engaged. Do you disagree with that?”
“Applicants who have engaged in bestiality means they were victims of bestiality because they were forced to do so,” replied Patel. “At this FBI we are not going to criminalize and prevent victims from serving.”
In a further exchange, Patel explained to Senator John Kennedy, the Louisiana Republican, that previously, regulations had barred anyone who engaged in bestiality “on either side of it.”
“Either side of what, the bestiality?” asked Kennedy. “So you disqualified the animal?”
“We have great canines, but we’re not going to disqualify them,” said Patel.
Kennedy said that the change in standards had “really hurt the FBI.”