Ex-Trump national security adviser John Bolton’s home, office raided by FBI
By Eric Tucker
Washington: The FBI on Friday searched the Maryland home and Washington office of former Trump administration national security adviser John Bolton as part of a criminal investigation into the potential mishandling of classified information, a person familiar with the matter said.
Bolton emerged as an outspoken critic of US President Donald Trump after being fired in 2019 and feuded with the first Trump administration over a scathing book he wrote documenting his time in the White House.
Police outside John Bolton’s house as FBI agents search the premises.Credit: AP
He was not in custody on Friday (Saturday AEST) and has not been charged with any crimes, said the person, who was not authorised to discuss the investigation by name and spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity.
Speaking to reporters during an unscheduled visit to the White House Historical Association, Trump said he had seen news coverage of Friday’s search but he didn’t know anything about it. He called Bolton a “lowlife” and said he was “not a fan”.
“He could be a very unpatriotic guy,” Trump said. “We’re going to find out.”
Bolton had said in interviews in the past few months that he was mindful that he could be scrutinised, telling the AP in January shortly before Trump took office: “Anybody who ever disagrees with Trump has to worry about retribution. It’s a pretty long list.”
John Bolton served as Donald Trump’s national security adviser during his first term before being fired in 2019.Credit: AP
“It’s been a long time since people used to talk about Richard Nixon’s enemies list. But that seems to be Trump’s approach. And so it’s uncharted territory in many respects,” Bolton said.
Bolton was not home for the search of his home, but after it started, he was spotted Friday morning standing in the lobby of the Washington building where he keeps an office and talking to two people with “FBI” visible on their vests. He left a few minutes later and appeared to have gone upstairs in the building. Agents were seen taking bags into the office building through a back entrance.
Messages left with a spokesperson for Bolton were not immediately returned, and a lawyer who has represented Bolton had no immediate comment.
The Justice Department had no comment, but leaders appeared to cryptically refer to the search of Bolton’s home in a series of social media posts on Friday morning.
FBI agents carry empty boxes to former national security adviser John Bolton’s house.Credit: AP
FBI Director Kash Patel posted on X: “NO ONE is above the law… @FBI agents on mission.” Attorney-General Pam Bondi shared his post, adding: “America’s safety isn’t negotiable. Justice will be pursued. Always.”
The searches, seemingly the most significant public step the Justice Department has taken against a perceived enemy of the president, are likely to elicit fresh alarm that the Trump administration is using its law enforcement powers to target the Republican’s foes.
The Justice Department is separately conducting mortgage fraud investigations into Democratic Senator Adam Schiff of California and New York Attorney-General Letitia James, who brought a civil fraud lawsuit against Trump and his company, and ex-Trump prosecutor Jack Smith faces an investigation from an independent watchdog office. Schiff and James have vigorously denied any wrongdoing through their lawyers.
Bolton served as Trump’s third national security adviser for 17 months and clashed with him over Iran, Afghanistan and North Korea. He faced scrutiny during the first Trump administration over a book he wrote about his time in government that officials argued disclosed classified information, but the Justice Department in 2021 abandoned its lawsuit and dropped a separate grand jury investigation.
FBI agents walk out the front entrance of former national security adviser John Bolton’s Washington office.Credit: AP
Bolton’s lawyers have said he moved forward with the book after a White House National Security Council official, with whom Bolton had worked for months, said the manuscript no longer contained classified information.
The handling of classified information by top government officials has been a politically loaded topic in recent years. Besides Trump, the Justice Department also investigated whether then-president Joe Biden, a Democrat, mishandled classified information after serving as vice president in the Obama administration, and the FBI also recovered what it said were classified documents from the home of former Trump vice president Mike Pence. Neither man was charged.
Trump, on his first day back in office this year, revoked the security clearances of more than four dozen former intelligence officials, including Bolton. Bolton was also among a group of former Trump officials whose security details were cancelled by Trump earlier this year.
Bolton’s harshly critical book, The Room Where It Happened, portrayed Trump as grossly ill-informed about foreign policy and said he “saw conspiracies behind rocks, and remained stunningly uninformed on how to run the White House, let alone the huge federal government”.
Trump responded by slamming Bolton as a “crazy” warmonger who would have led the country into “World War Six”.
Bolton served as US ambassador to the United Nations under George W. Bush and also held positions in Ronald Reagan’s administration. He considered running for president in 2012 and 2016.
In 2022, an Iranian operative was charged in a plot to kill Bolton in presumed retaliation for a 2020 US airstrike that killed the country’s most powerful general. Bolton had by then left the Trump administration, but he tweeted: “Hope this is the first step to regime change in Tehran.”
AP
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