FBI Director Kash Patel says the bureau has launched an unprecedented law enforcement partnership with China and Russia, arguing that carefully controlled cooperation with two of America’s chief geopolitical rivals is producing results in the fight against fentanyl trafficking, cybercrime, child exploitation, and other international criminal networks, Reuters reports.

According to Patel, the collaborations involve narrowly tailored investigations focused solely on specific categories of transnational crime rather than broader intelligence sharing. The FBI director said the initiative has already led to joint operations, intelligence exchanges, and coordinated arrests.

As part of the arrangement, Chinese law enforcement officials have traveled to the United States to work alongside FBI personnel, while American agents have made reciprocal visits to China to investigate cases and exchange information. FBI officials also said the two countries have conducted joint raids and arrests under the program.

Patel returned from Beijing in late July after meeting with Chinese officials, and FBI officials say a similar visit to Russia is tentatively scheduled for October.

In interviews with Reuters, Patel described the new relationships as partnerships with “non-traditional partners,” stressing that they are limited to targeted efforts against crimes such as international child pornography rings, cyber scam operations targeting Americans, fentanyl trafficking, and other cross-border criminal enterprises.

The initiative, organized internally through specialized “working groups,” represents a dramatic departure from longstanding FBI practice. It has also drawn concern from members of the counterintelligence community, who warn that working closely with authoritarian governments could expose sensitive U.S. security information to countries that actively seek to undermine America’s military, economic, and intelligence interests.

One example cited by the FBI occurred in May, when agents partnered with China’s Ministry of Public Security and Dubai police during “Operation Sand Dollar.” According to the bureau, the raid targeted a major cyber fraud center in Dubai, resulting in 300 arrests, the seizure of $300 million, and the rescue of thousands of trafficked workers.

Chinese state media also reported that one suspect accused of committing “serious violent crimes” was returned from China to the United States under the new cooperative framework.

For years, U.S. officials have viewed both China and Russia primarily as sources of espionage and international criminal activity rather than partners in combating those threats. Patel, who was appointed FBI director by President Donald Trump, acknowledged those concerns but argued that the risks can be managed.

“They are both new and dynamic relationships, and we are extremely mindful of their adversarial approach on many matters,” Patel said. “They are not going to stop, but if we can go and have wins for America, then we must engage.”

Patel said the current relationship began following President Trump’s trip to China in May 2025 and has since expanded through two of his own visits to Beijing. According to Patel, cooperation now centers on four working groups covering cyber fraud, crimes against children, counternarcotics, and fugitive investigations.

He also said officials from China’s Ministry of Public Security have been invited to multiple FBI facilities in the United States to exchange intelligence and investigative information.

“Every month, they send their working-level MPS officers here, and the following month we go there,” Patel said. “They are speaking with us daily, which has also never happened before.”

Asked about the growing law enforcement relationship, a spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Washington said, “We have always believed that dialog and negotiation are the right way forward, and that military means offer no solution.”

Patel emphasized that the intelligence exchanged is tightly restricted and applies only to the four agreed-upon categories of transnational crime. He also insisted that these partnerships are not intended to replace America’s traditional intelligence alliances, including the Five Eyes network with Canada, Australia, Britain, and New Zealand.

“Five Eyes will always be our most important intelligence relationship. No one is trying to replace that,” Patel said. “Unlike military and traditional intelligence agencies, we have a unique lane to drive this dynamic change with law enforcement, which is an apolitical mission.”

While in Asia last month, Patel met with Chinese Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong and Vice Minister Xu Datong to expand what Chinese state media described as “practical cooperation” against a range of criminal activities.

The expanded cooperation marks a significant shift in U.S. law enforcement policy and reflects President Trump’s broader diplomatic engagement with Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Not everyone is convinced the strategy is wise.

“China and Russia are our enemies, period,” said Jeff Crocker, a former FBI supervisory agent who retired in 2024. “They are actively trying to harm our country physically, economically and militarily.”

Crocker warned that allowing Chinese officials access to FBI facilities, intelligence personnel, and other government infrastructure carries substantial counterintelligence risks. He argued that both Chinese and Russian operatives would likely exploit any opportunity to gather intelligence or penetrate sensitive systems.

“So this is great cover ⁠for them,” Crocker said.

Patel responded that every foreign visitor undergoes extensive vetting and is subject to strict counterintelligence safeguards. Three former FBI employees told Reuters that such visits typically involve extensive physical and electronic monitoring, particularly for representatives of countries viewed as America’s most dangerous adversaries.

“We know exactly who is coming here, and we vet them,” Patel said.

Neither the Kremlin nor the Russian Embassy in Washington immediately responded to Reuters’ requests for comment.

Patel also revealed that the FBI has spent months quietly coordinating with Russian authorities on investigations targeting violent transnational criminal organizations.

“This stuff doesn’t happen overnight,” Patel said. “We’ve been at this for 15 months.”

An internal FBI memorandum reviewed by Reuters credited the bureau’s partnership with China’s Ministry of Public Security for several operations targeting Chinese pharmaceutical companies this year.

According to the memo, those investigations resulted in the arrests of nine individuals, the closure of two chemical manufacturing facilities and three related websites, and the seizure of fentanyl precursor chemicals “likely otherwise destined for the United States.”

The memo did not identify where those arrests or seizures occurred.

Vanda Felbab-Brown, a senior fellow specializing in foreign policy at the Brookings Institution, said fentanyl overdose deaths in the United States have dropped significantly since the winter of 2022, likely because of several factors, including cooperation with China and broader access to the overdose-reversal drug Naloxone.

“It could be that the people who were already vulnerable had already died,” Felbab-Brown said.

“I think that the cooperation is useful, should be fostered, and that it contributed to some extent,” Felbab-Brown said, referring to the decline in U.S. overdoses. “But how much is really hard to know, and there are a lot of complexities to it.”

The FBI memo also said Chinese law enforcement partnered with agents from the bureau’s Omaha, Nebraska, field office during a June operation that dismantled an international child sexual abuse materials network, resulting in the arrests of 16 suspects.

The growing partnership follows years of strained relations between Washington and Beijing. U.S. officials have long accused China of failing to stop the production of precursor chemicals used to manufacture fentanyl, while Chinese authorities suspended cooperation after political disputes, including then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s 2022 visit to Taiwan.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio offered a measured assessment of the renewed cooperation. Speaking during a visit to the Philippines last month, Rubio described the effort to curb fentanyl precursor shipments as “a work in progress.”

“I think we’ve made some progress on that front, but not entirely where we need to be,” Rubio told reporters.

Patel said the framework developed with China and Russia could eventually serve as a model for law enforcement cooperation with other countries when doing so advances U.S. interests.

“The fact that we did it with China,” Patel said, “when everyone said, ‘Don’t do it,’ and, ‘You can’t do it,’ shows what we can do with almost anyone.”