Kash Patel has vowed to drastically reshape the F.B.I., but whether that threat is real or just bombast remains unknown unless and until he is confirmed as the ninth director of the bureau.

Some of those promises are already underway, including gutting the bureau’s headquarters and scattering special agents to field offices around the country.

“I’d shut down the F.B.I. Hoover Building on Day 1 and reopen it the next day as a museum of the ‘deep state,’” Mr. Patel said on “The Shawn Ryan Show,” a podcast. “Then, I’d take the 7,000 employees that work in that building and send them across America to chase down criminals. Go be cops. You’re cops — go be cops.”

Former officials say a much small number of agents and support staff members work at the actual building. However, they widely supported the idea of sending more agents into the field to support operations where offices were understaffed.

The bureau has long planned to reduce the footprint of its headquarters and move employees to an expansive campus in Huntsville, Ala. A senior F.B.I. official referred to it in 2023 as the bureau’s “unofficial second headquarters.”

Already 2,000 employees work at the sprawling installation, and the F.B.I. says an additional 3,000 could be there by the end of the decade.

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