FBI Director Kash Patel announced Friday that the bureau has eliminated a massive backlog of DNA samples that had climbed to roughly 1.8 million in 2024 – samples that can provide investigators with leads in homicides, sexual assaults and other violent crimes.
Under the DNA Fingerprint Act of 2005, federal agencies collect DNA from certain federal arrestees and convicted offenders, as well as non-U.S. persons detained under federal authority. Those samples are submitted to the FBI Laboratory for analysis and entry into the Combined DNA Index System, better known as CODIS. CODIS allows DNA profiles to be compared with evidence from unsolved cases. The FBI says the system has aided hundreds of thousands of investigations nationwide.
And the backlog Patel inherited was enormous. In July 2024, the FBI told Congress it had more than 1.7 million samples awaiting processing, after monthly submissions had surged dramatically. By the end of fiscal year 2024, Justice Department budget documents put the backlog at approximately 1.8 million samples.
Patel said the bureau attacked the backlog by dedicating additional resources and equipment, improving its IT systems and using business analytics to streamline DNA processing. The result: 1.8 million became zero.
“TODAY – that DNA backlog is officially at ZERO,” Patel announced on X. That’s quite a turnaround for a pile of unprocessed DNA that the FBI itself previously warned could delay investigative leads.
You asked for results, we made the changes necessary for this FBI to deliver- one example, DNA:
We are statutorily required under the “DNA Fingerprint Act of 2005” to receive and process collected DNA samples from federally convicted offenders, arrestees, and non-U.S. citizen…
— FBI Director Kash Patel (@FBIDirectorKash) August 21, 2026 [1]
Patel blamed the previous backlog on “institutionalized bureaucracy from prior leadership” and credited FBI Laboratory Division employees with eliminating it.
For investigators trying to catch the bad guys, DNA does a lot more good in a database than sitting in a backlog.