The FBI on Friday morning searched the Maryland home and Washington office of John Bolton, the former national security adviser to Donald Trump who has since become one of the president’s fiercest critics.
Federal agents arrived at Bolton’s Bethesda residence around 7 a.m., according to The New York Post, which first broke the news.
He was reportedly home at the time but was neither detained nor charged.
The investigation involves the handling of classified documents, according to The Post, though details remain unclear.
A senior U.S. official told the New York Post the inquiry had been launched “years ago” but was previously shut down “for political reasons.”
FBI Director Patel appeared to possibly celebrate the move on X., posting: “NO ONE is above the law… @FBI agents on mission,” just minutes after 7 on Friday morning.
The spectacle of FBI agents raiding the home of a prominent Trump enemy is bound to deepen questions about how law enforcement powers are being used.
The Associated Press noted the Bolton searches come as the Trump administration has moved against other perceived enemies, including opening a grand jury probe into the origins of the Russia investigation.
During Trump’s first term, the White House tried to block the release of Bolton’s memoir, claiming it contained classified information. When he returned to the White House this year, the president quickly moved to revoke his former national security adviser’s security clearance, along that of many others.
Bolton, a longtime hawkish Republican foreign policy hand and former U.N. ambassador, left the Trump White House in 2019. He and his former boss have since traded insults: Bolton has described Trump’s mind as “full of mush” and said that “chaos embedded in his DNA and endemic in his team” while Trump in recent weeks lumped Bolton in with “stupid people” making the Ukraine war harder to resolve, also referring to him as a “fired loser” and “really dumb.” In 2020, Trump said the United States would have been in “World War Six” if he had followed Bolton’s advice.
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