OPINION:
As Kash Patel directs a whirlwind of law enforcement operations, he is also keeping an eye on two defamation cases brought by him and his girlfriend.
At FBI headquarters, the director is purging the bureau of James Comey alumni, dispatching agents to the streets to fight urban crime, investigating the bungled Crossfire Hurricane that unfairly targeted President Trump and, on Sept. 12, saw his agents and local cops catch the accused killer of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
In the civil cases, Mr. Patel just won a libel case against a blogger who falsely claimed Mr. Patel was a Kremlin “asset.” In the other case, his country music singer girlfriend, Alexis Wilkins, 26, has sued a former FBI agent for defamation. The defendant is Kyle Seraphin, a podcaster on Rumble and other platforms, a critic of Mr. Patel and a federal whistleblower.
On “The Kyle Seraphin Show” on Aug. 22, Mr. Seraphin asserted that Ms. Wilkins is a tool of Mossad, Israel’s storied intelligence service. If this lawsuit moves to the evidence discovery phase, you can bet the FBI director would be summoned to testify.
Ms. Wilkins, a conservative commentator, has been in a romantic relationship with Mr. Patel, 45, since January 2023. She gets right to the point in her eight-page lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Austin, Texas, the defendant’s home state.
“Defendant Kyle M. Seraphin has maliciously lied about Alexis Wilkins, falsely asserting that she — an American-born country singer — is an agent of a foreign government, assigned to manipulate and compromise the Director of the FBI. Defendant, a former FBI special agent himself, who now makes a living as a podcaster and political commentator — profiting on controversy and outrage — is using this fabricated story as self-enriching clickbait.”
On the same episode of his show this month, Mr. Seraphin called Ms. Wilkins a “honeypot.” That’s spy slang for an attractive woman deployed to compromise a government official to give up secrets.
By the way, when this “honeypot” supposedly started in 2023, Mr. Patel — once a trusted aide to former Rep. Devin Nunes and now a senior intelligence adviser to President Trump — was out of the government. So was Mr. Trump.
Here is what Mr. Seraphin said about the Washington power couple, according to the lawsuit transcription.
“[FBI Director Kash Patel] has had his own little ‘honeypot’ issue that’s been going on of late, so we’re just going to acknowledge it real publicly,” he said. “He’s got a girlfriend that is half his age, who is apparently is both a country music singer, a political commentator on Rumble, a friend of John Rich through [FBI Deputy Director Dan] Bongino, who also now owns a big chunk of Rumble, and she’s also a former Mossad agent in what is like the equivalent of their NSA.”
He also focused on the age gap.
“But I’m sure that’s totally because, like, she’s really looking for, like, a cross-eyed, you know, kind of thickish built, super cool bro who’s almost 50 years old who’s Indian in America,” he said.
The Wilkins filing countered: “She is a patriotic, conservative, Christian, country music artist and published writer, who also works for a conservative advocacy and educational company, PragerU.”
“He is accusing Ms. Wilkins of being a spy for a foreign government … and even committing treason. These accusations are all categorically false, and Defendant knows it. … She is not now and never has been an agent for any intelligence agency.”
With the lawsuit filed, a flabbergasted Mr. Seraphin went on air Aug. 29 with a no-apologies defense. He said other social media platforms posted the same conspiracy theories about Ms. Wilkins before he did. He said Ms. Wilkins has a job resume of bouncing between jobs, including one as an aide to a Muslim House member and a media job at PragerU, of which Mr. Seraphin said: “People allege [it] has intelligence ties. I don’t have any proof.”
Of her seeking $5 million in damages, Mr. Seraphin said, “I don’t know what the damages are when you yourself and your boyfriend went out there and promoted the story far bigger than it ever would have been.”
A week before the Wilkins lawsuit, Mr. Patel received good news on another legal front. A judge awarded him $250,000 in damages caused by blogger Jim Stewartson, a self-described “anti-fascist.” While Ms. Wilkins was labeled a Mossad operative, podcaster Mr. Stewartson accused Mr. Patel of being a “Kremlin asset” who planned the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol by Trump supporters protesting the 2020 election results.
Mr. Stewartson never answered the lawsuit. In Nevada, U.S. District Court Judge Andrew Gordon, a Barack Obama appointee, ruled that “defamatory falsehoods made with actual malice are not protected, even if directed at public officials.”
When Mr. Patel won a Senate confirmation vote in February, Mr. Seraphin offered praise. He was one of the FBI whistleblowing so-called “Suspendables” who left the bureau during the Biden years.
“There’s a potential that Kash Patel could be the most loved FBI director by the actual people of the FBI. He could be the real thing that Jim Comey pretended to be,” Mr. Seraphin told NBC News. However, he became a harsh critic of Mr. Patel, and that has not changed since the Wilkins lawsuit.
When Mr. Patel touted law enforcement for quickly catching Tyler Robinson, the man accused of killing Kirk, Mr. Seraphin said, “Kash is a hero. Just ask him. He single-handedly solved the case by overruling no one AND following basic law enforcement [standard operating procedure].”
I asked Mr. Seraphin about his early praise. “My statement has the word ‘potential’ in it,” he said. “On purpose. He immediately made poor decisions just prior to his confirmation that ruled out the possibility of actually achieving that potential.”
• Rowan Scarborough is a columnist with The Washington Times.
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