Indian-American Kash Patel Hired As Chief Of Staff To Acting US Defence Secretary

Wasington: Indian-American Kash Patel has been recruited as the Chief of Staff to the Acting US Defence Secretary Chris Miller, the Pentagon announced.

Kash Patel, 39, was appointed a day after outgoing President Donald Trump fired Defence Secretary Mark Esper and designated the National Counter Terrorism Center Director, Chris Miller, as the Acting Secretary of Defence, news agency PTI reported.

“Kash Patel, currently on the National Security Council staff, has been named by Acting Secretary Miller as his Chief of Staff,” the Pentagon said on Tuesday. He has replaced  Jen Stewart, who had resigned earlier.

New York-born Kashyap Pramod Patel, popularly known as Kash Patel has his roots in Gujarat. He had previously served as senior counsel for counter-terrorism at the House Permanent Select Committee.

In June 2019, he served as senior director of the Counter-Terrorism Directorate of the National Security Council (NSC) in the White House.

On the other hand, US President-elect Joe Biden has named over 20 Indian-Americans as members to his agency review teams (ARTs) that are “responsible for evaluating the operations of the key federal agencies in the current administration to ensure smooth transfer of power”, LiveMint reported.