FBI spokesperson: the bureau is "not relaxing hiring standards"
FBI spokesperson / National Press Office
“Not relaxing hiring standards... whole of person [consideration]... zero fault of their own.”
Source and context
Reporting
About this source
Original investigative report disclosing the FBI’s June 2026 policy change removing automatic disqualification for prostitution, employee theft, and bestiality/animal-cruelty history, based on multiple sources with direct knowledge, with on-record comment from an FBI spokesperson and named critics.
Reporting
About this source
Clearest account of the Durbin/Patel disagreement over whether the "victims" framing accurately describes the policy, and the fullest quoted FBI spokesperson statement.
Before the quotation
Provided to CBS News for its original report and restated in substantially similar form around the September 15, 2026 hearing.
After the quotation
This framing was directly disputed by Sen. Dick Durbin in the September 15, 2026 hearing exchange.
How this statement is classified
Case context: Kash Patel defends FBI’s removal of automatic hiring disqualifiers for bestiality, prostitution, and employee theft
The label describes this statement’s response within the context above.
Why this label?
The FBI’s own spokesperson directly defends the policy as narrow and victim-protective, denying it lowers hiring standards — an institutional defense of the conduct under scrutiny.
- Recorded on
- Published here
Kash Patel defends FBI’s removal of automatic hiring disqualifiers for bestiality, prostitution, and employee theft
Explore the case context, sources and public responses.
More from this case
Read the full case“In 21 years in the FBI, this issue never came up... the fact that the director is using this as a way to kind of soften the blow... is not entirely believable in my estimation. The idea that the FBI director would put his own credibility and judgment on the line over something as esoteric and irrelevant as protecting victims of bestiality who might happen to want to work for the FBI is really unconscionable to me.”Read statement
“Why would you even get into bestiality?... So you disqualified the animal?... But you’re not telling us today that if a human being had sex with an animal, they can still be an FBI agent?”Read statement
“You dropped automatic disqualification for applicants who have been engaged in bestiality, not victims of bestiality – applicants who have engaged.”Read statement