Kash Patel names FBI agent Raia as deputy after Bongino's exit

Myles Miller, Bloomberg News on Jan 9, 2026

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WASHINGTON — FBI Director Kash Patel selected Christopher Raia, a career counterterrorism official who led the investigation into the 2025 New Orleans New Year’s attack, as co-deputy director of the bureau.

Raia most recently served as assistant director in charge of the FBI’s New York field office, one of the bureau’s most prominent posts. He will share deputy director responsibilities with Andrew Bailey, the former Missouri attorney general who was appointed co-deputy director in August 2025.

The announcement comes a week after Dan Bongino, a conservative podcaster who served as deputy director, left the post following clashes with Attorney General Pam Bondi and senior White House officials over the handling of the Jeffrey Epstein investigation.

Bongino’s tenure highlighted tensions within President Donald Trump’s law-enforcement team over politically-charged investigations. His exit marked the highest-ranking departure at the Federal Bureau of Investigation during Trump’s second term.

Raia’s elevation represents a return to the traditional FBI leadership model, with a deputy director role filled by a career agent who has risen through the ranks, rather than an outsider with limited law enforcement experience. The role manages daily operations for an agency with more than 37,000 employees, including a dozen senior officials in Washington and leaders at more than 50 field offices.

Before Raia took the job at the New York field office in April 2025, he served as deputy assistant director at the FBI’s counter-terrorism division in Washington, D.C.

In that role, Raia oversaw the bureau’s response to the Jan. 1, 2025, terror attack on Bourbon Street in New Orleans, where a truck driver plowed through crowds of New Year’s revelers, killing 14 people and injuring dozens.

Raia joined the FBI in 2003 as a special agent in the FBI’s Texas City Resident Agency, where he spent a decade investigating violent crime, gangs, drugs and white-collar crime. He later oversaw international terrorism cases across multiple field offices and worked as chief of staff for the executive assistant director of the national security branch.

A graduate of the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, Raia served as a Coast Guard officer in Florida before joining the FBI.