Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation

The **Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation** is the head of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

## Responsibilities

The director is responsible for the day-to-day operations. Along with the deputy director, the director makes sure cases and operations are handled correctly. The director also is in charge of hiring the leaders in any one of the FBI field offices with qualified agents. The director advised the president on any issues that arose from within the FBI. This was until the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 was enacted in response to the September 11 attacks.  Since then, the director reports to the Director of National Intelligence, who in turn reports to the president.

## Background

Directors are appointed by the President of the United States and confirmed by the Senate. In theory, they serve ten-year terms unless they resign, die, or are let go. In reality, none have served a full ten years, except J. Edgar Hoover and Robert Mueller. They both served longer than ten years. J. Edgar Hoover was appointed by Calvin Coolidge to the office in 1924. He was by far the longest-serving director. Hoover held the position from its establishment under the current title in 1935 until his death in 1972 because there was then no law limiting service time. In response to Hoover's lengthy tenure, Congress imposed a term limit of ten years (waived by the Senate for Robert Mueller on July 27, 2011). The current FBI director is Christopher A. Wray, who assumed his position on August 2, 2017.

When the Bureau of Investigation (BOI) was established in 1908, its head was called the **Chief of the Bureau of Investigation**. It was changed to the **Director of the Bureau of Investigation** since the term of William J. Flynn (1919–1921), and to its current name when the BOI was renamed FBI in 1935.

## List of all directors

|class=unsortable|Image|colspan=2|Name|Start|End|Duration|colspan=2|President(s)|||||||||
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|rowspan=6|1|rowspan=6||rowspan=6 style="background: ;"||rowspan=6||rowspan=6||rowspan=6||rowspan=6||style="background: ;"||(1933–1945)|
|style="background: ;"||(1945–1953)|||||||||||||||
|style="background: ;"||(1953–1961)|||||||||||||||
|style="background: ;"||(1961–1963)|||||||||||||||
|style="background: ;"||(1963–1969)|||||||||||||||
|rowspan=5 style="background: ;"||rowspan=5|(1969–1974)||||||||||||||
|–||style="background: ;"|||||||||||||||
|–||style="background: ;"|||||||||||||||
|–||style="background: ;"|||||||||||||||
|rowspan=3|2|rowspan=3||rowspan=3 style="background: ;"||rowspan=3||rowspan=3||rowspan=3||rowspan=3|||||
|style="background: ;"||(1974–1977)|||||||||||||||
|rowspan=3 style="background: ;"||rowspan=3|(1977–1981)||||||||||||||
|–||style="background: ;"|||||||||||||||
|rowspan=2|3|rowspan=2||rowspan=2 style="background: ;"||rowspan=2||rowspan=2||rowspan=2||rowspan=2|||||
|rowspan=3 style="background: ;"||rowspan=3|(1981–1989)||||||||||||||
|–||style="background: ;"|||||||||||||||
|rowspan=3|4|rowspan=3||rowspan=3 style="background: ;"||rowspan=3||rowspan=3||rowspan=3||rowspan=3|||||
|style="background: ;"||(1989–1993)|||||||||||||||
|rowspan=3 style="background: ;"||rowspan=3|(1993–2001)||||||||||||||
|–||style="background: ;"|||||||||||||||
|rowspan=2|5|rowspan=2||rowspan=2 style="background: ;"||rowspan=2||rowspan=2||rowspan=2||rowspan=2|||||
|rowspan=3 style="background: ;"||rowspan=3|(2001–2009)||||||||||||||
|–||style="background: ;"|||||||||||||||
|rowspan=2|6|rowspan=2||rowspan=2 style="background: ;"||rowspan=2||rowspan=2||rowspan=2||rowspan=2|||||
|rowspan=2 style="background: ;"||rowspan=2|(2009–2017)||||||||||||||
|rowspan=2|7|rowspan=2||rowspan=2 style="background: ;"||rowspan=2||rowspan=2||rowspan=2||rowspan=2|||||
|rowspan=3 style="background: ;"||rowspan=3|(2017–2021)||||||||||||||
|–||style="background: ;"|||||||||||||||
|rowspan=2|8|rowspan=2||rowspan=2 style="background: ;"||rowspan=2||rowspan=2||rowspan=2||rowspan=2|||||
|rowspan=2 style="background: ;"||rowspan=2|(2021–2025)||||||||||||||
|–||style="background: ;"|||||||||||||||
|–||style="background: ;"||||||rowspan=2 style="background: ;"||rowspan=2 bgcolor="#ffffff"|(2025–present)||||||
|rowspan=2|9|rowspan=2||rowspan=2 style="background: ;"||rowspan=2|||present||||||||

## Infobox (official post)

- **post**: Director
- **body**: the Federal Bureau of Investigation
- **insignia**: US-FBI-ShadedSeal.svg
- **insigniasize**: 120
- **insigniacaption**: Seal of the FBI
- **flag**: Flag of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.svg
- **flagsize**: 130
- **flagcaption**: Flag of the FBI
- **image**: Kash Patel, official FBI portrait (cropped 1).jpg
- **incumbent**: Kash Patel
- **incumbentsince**: February 21, 2025
- **department**: Federal Bureau of Investigation
- **reports to**: United States Attorney General, Attorney General
Director of National Intelligence
- **seat**: J. Edgar Hoover Building, Washington, D.C.
- **appointer**: The President of the United States, President
- **appointer qualified**: with United States Senate, Senate advice and consent
- **termlength**: At the pleasure of the President. (10 years by statute), renewable (only by the Senate)
- **first**: Stanley Finch
- **formation**: July 26, 1908
- **deputy**: Deputy Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Deputy Director