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Donald Trump's decision to hand newly appointed FBI Director Kash Patel the reins as the interim head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), has to the department being adrift with Patel reportedly ignoring his duties.

According to a report from the Washington Post, since being tasked with running the department and overseeing its 5,000 employees, Patel made a brief appearance and has since been a no-show at the headquarters leaving staffers adrift and wondering what is next.

As the Post's Perry Stein and Yvonne Wingett Sanchez wrote, "Patel arrived at ATF’s Northeast Washington headquarters, snapped photos in the lobby, met career leaders and commended their work, according to multiple people familiar with the visit. But since then, Patel has not returned, and there appears to be scant communication between the acting director and the people who work for the 5,000-person agency, said the people familiar with the situation."

The controversial Patel, who was made the new FBI director by the scantest of margins in a Senate vote, now has ATF staffers wondering about their jobs going forward.

Reporting that worries about the department has "been percolating for weeks," the Post reports adds, "Multiple people familiar with hiring process said the Trump administration has interviewed candidates to lead the agency, but the president so far has not nominated anyone. The administration hasn’t made major personnel changes at ATF during its first two months, though there have been some shake-ups."

According to one White House insider, "“By tapping Patel as Acting Director, the President may well be telegraphing his intent to eventually abolish the ATF, first by eliminating its bad parts and then by folding the good parts, like the arson and ballistics labs, into the FBI."

Kash Patel had floor cleared at FBI with staffers told to pack up their desks:

Donald Trump's choice to be the new director of the FBI got off to a rough start on Thursday after he was confirmed by the Republican-controlled Senate by only two votes.

According to MSNBC's Ken Dilanian, on Friday the controversial Kash Patel struck a "conciliatory" tone with employees of the FBI, which was a change from his first encounter.

Speaking with MSNBC host José Díaz-Balart, the justice and intelligence correspondent reported that, before Patel made his appearance on Thursday, the 7th floor at the FBI headquarters was ordered cleared.

"Yesterday when he first arrived at the bureau headquarters, to some people, he was sending a bit of a different message because what I'm told by three people familiar with the matter, is that before he arrived all the support employees on the seventh floor where the director's office is –– I'm talking about executive assistants and people who move the paper around, the bureaucracy ––they were all told to pack their desks."

"They were being reassigned, and they were to be removed from the seventh floor and then when he arrived with his own team the director's suite was sealed off, I'm told, and no one else saw him essentially assuming command."

He then added, "So those people they're not fired, they're civil servants, and they're going to find other jobs within the organization. But it is sending a message to some people at the FBI, at least, that Mr. Patel doesn't necessarily trust the workforce that he has now been assigned to oversee."