Ka$h on the rocks? REVEALED! FBI Director Kash Patel handing out personalised bourbon bottles, while suing over claims he drinks too much
&imwidth=600&imheight=450&format=webp&quality=medium "Ka$h on the rocks? REVEALED! FBI Director Kash Patel handing out personalised bourbon bottles, while suing over claims he drinks too much")
FBI Director Kash Patel attends a US Hostage and Wrongful Detainee flag raising ceremony at the State Department in Washington, DC, on March 9, 2026. Photograph: (AFP)
Kash Patel’s alleged personalised bourbon bottle habit is now colliding headfirst with his drinking controversy. A new report claims the FBI director handed out engraved “Ka$h” whiskey bottles to staff and officials. All you need to know.
Kash Patel, the FBI director currently suing The Atlantic for reporting on his alleged excessive drinking, has been regularly gifting personalised bottles of Kentucky bourbon to FBI staff and civilians he encounters in his official duties, according to a new report from the same outlet. The Atlantic's Sarah Fitzpatrick, the journalist Patel is suing for $250 million, reported that Woodford Reserve bottles engraved with "Kash Patel FBI Director," an FBI shield and Patel's preferred stylisation of his name, "Ka$h," have become a recognisable feature of his tenure.
Amid drinking controversy, Kash Patel's bourbon leak
Eight current and former FBI and Justice Department employees confirmed to the outlet that they've received Patel's personalised bottles. The Atlantic said it purchased one of the bottles after it appeared in an online auction, sold by someone who said it was a gift from Patel at an event in Las Vegas.
While the FBI insisted that the liquor was purchased by Kash Patel on his own buck, the bottles have reportedly been transported on Justice Department aircraft. Patel allegedly brought them to Milan when he was photographed drinking beer with the US men's Olympic hockey team, an outing that did not go over well with President Trump, who does not drink. One bottle was reportedly left behind in the Italian locker room.
Kash Patel threatened a polygraph over missing bourbon bottle
Trending Stories
)
&im=FitAndFill=(700,400))
&im=FitAndFill=(700,400))
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
&im=FitAndFill=(700,400))
)
&im=FitAndFill=(700,400))
)
)
)
&im=FitAndFill=(700,400))
&im=FitAndFill=(700,400))
&im=FitAndFill=(700,400))
&im=FitAndFill=(700,400))
)
)
)
)
)
&im=FitAndFill=(700,400))
)
)
In March, Patel allegedly brought an entire case of personalised bourbon to a "training seminar" with the UFC at the FBI's Quantico facility. When one bottle went missing, Patel reportedly "lost his mind" and even threatened polygraph tests and potential prosecution of agents over the missing bottle.
Also read | Gas hits $4.50 a gallon as Trump's approval ratings sink to record low ahead of US midterms
Kurt Siuzdak, a retired agent who assists FBI employees with legal issues, told The Atlantic he was subsequently contacted by multiple agents seeking legal help. "It turned into a shitshow," he said.
The FBI did not dispute that Patel hands out the bottles, but said the practice was within ethics guidelines and described it as part of "a tradition in the FBI that started well over a decade ago". However, the agency failed to provide evidence of previous directors doing anything similar. Several current and former FBI officials told The Atlantic the practice was basically unheard of for a director.
George Hill, a former FBI supervisory intelligence analyst, was blunt. "Handing out bottles of liquor at the premier law-enforcement agency, it makes me frightened for the country. Standards apply to everything and everyone, especially the boss."
Newsom pokes fun at Kash Patel
California Governor Gavin Newsom, in an X post, slammed Patel, saying, "Glad that Kash Patel is focused on the issues that matter: handing out bottles of his liquor, allegedly drinking on the job, and spending our taxpayer dollars on his girlfriend."
Kash Patel's alleged drinking problem
The bourbon story follows an earlier Atlantic piece detailing what the outlet described as Patel's unexplained absences, erratic behaviour and bouts of excessive drinking, including an incident in which his security team reportedly struggled to wake him and another in which officials requested specialised breaching equipment to reach him behind a locked door. One FBI official told the outlet: "That's what keeps me up at night" referring to concerns about what would happen if the FBI director were unreachable during a domestic terror attack.
Patel has denied all of it and filed suit against The Atlantic and Fitzpatrick. The FBI has also reportedly opened a criminal leak investigation into Fitzpatrick in connection with the original article, an unusual move given that leak investigations typically focus on government officials rather than journalists.
The Atlantic's editor in chief Jeffrey Goldberg called the reported investigation "an outrageous attack on the free press and the First Amendment itself," vowing the outlet would "not be intimidated by illegitimate investigations or other acts of politically motivated retaliation."
