Trump administration plans to scrutinize FBI agents for possible purge

The Trump administration plans to scrutinize thousands of FBI agents involved in Jan. 6 investigations, setting the stage for a possible purge that goes far beyond the bureau’s leaders to target rank-and-file agents, according to internal documents and people familiar with the matter.

The proposal came on a day that more than a dozen prosecutors at the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington who had worked on cases involving the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot were told that they were being terminated.

The moves were a powerful indication that President Donald Trump has few qualms deploying the colossal might of federal law enforcement to punish perceived political enemies, even as his Cabinet nominees offered sober assurances they would abide by the rule of law. Forcing out both agents and prosecutors who worked on Jan. 6 cases would amount to a wide-scale assault on the Justice Department.

On Friday, interim leaders at the department instructed the FBI to notify more than a half-dozen high-ranking career officials that they faced termination, according to a copy of an internal memo obtained by The New York Times.

The acting attorney general, Emil Bove, also instructed the acting leadership of the FBI to compile a list of all agents and FBI staff “assigned at any time to investigations and/or prosecutions” relating to the events at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 — the day a mob of Trump supporters stormed through the halls of Congress.

The memo also demands the names of agents who worked on a case against Hamas leadership, though it is not clear why it was added to the list of agents under scrutiny.

The office of the deputy attorney general “will commence a review process to determine whether any additional personnel actions are necessary” against those FBI agents, analysts, and staff, according to the memo, which was addressed to Brian Driscoll, the acting FBI director.

In an email to FBI employees Friday night, Driscoll noted that he was among the agents who would be on such a list. The FBI has been told to submit the list of names by Tuesday.

“We understand that this request encompasses thousands of employees across the country who have supported these investigative efforts,” Driscoll wrote, adding that he and his deputy “are going to follow the law, follow FBI policy, and do what’s in the best interest of the workforce and the American people — always.”

People familiar with the internal discussions said that some Trump administration officials are moving to force scores, or possibly hundreds, of agents out of the FBI in the coming days and weeks. Officials have discussed notifying a large number of agents that they face possible termination, demotion, or transfer.

At the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington, more than a dozen prosecutors who had worked on Jan. 6-related cases were told that they were being terminated, according to people familiar with the notices.

Those informed of their dismissals had been hired as the office struggled to manage what became the largest prosecution in the department’s history.

In a memo, Bove said the prosecutors in question had been short-term hires that were improperly made permanent staff during the Biden administration. “I will not tolerate subversive personnel actions,” he wrote.

The moves come just one day after Kash Patel, Trump’s pick to lead the FBI, testified before Congress that the bureau would not be targeted for political reasons.

“All FBI employees will be protected against political retribution,” Patel said during his confirmation hearing Thursday.

Around the time that Patel appeared before the committee, a handful of senior FBI employees were informed that they needed to resign in a matter of days or be fired, part of a broader effort by the Trump administration to shake up the agency’s upper ranks.

The moves are highly unusual in part because they are happening before a director has been confirmed to take charge of the bureau. The timing of these moves — made while the nominations of Patel and Pam Bondi for attorney general are still pending — could lessen the blowback for them, or it could jeopardize their support among Republican senators.

A department spokesperson, and Patel’s representative, did not immediately respond to requests for comment. FBI officials declined to comment. The people familiar with the planning spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe internal discussions.

Privately, however, senior officials at the Justice Department have asked for the names of agents who worked on Jan. 6 cases.

In a statement, the FBI Agents Association said that if true, “these outrageous actions by acting officials are fundamentally at odds with the law enforcement objectives outlined by President Trump.”

“Dismissing potentially hundreds of agents would severely weaken the bureau’s ability to protect the country from national security and criminal threats,” the statement continued.

If the administration follows through, it would be a singular moment in the FBI’s history, and fly in the face of decades worth of civil service laws that are meant to protect the integrity and professionalism of the government workforce.

Patel, speaking under oath, also promised to follow established bureau procedures in seeking terminations or transfers, including referring accusations of improper conduct by prosecutors to the Justice Department’s inspector general before taking action.

FBI officials were already bracing for swift changes, but the forced retirements and the dismissal of senior agents in the field and at headquarters this week has led to fear at the bureau. Agents are worried they will be fired for investigations that angered Trump — especially those who worked on squads at the Washington field office on the criminal inquiry into Trump’s handling of classified documents as well as the inquiry into a fake electors’ scheme.

Two of the senior agents who ran field offices in Miami and Las Vegas and were forced out had been criticized by former agents with ties to Patel’s foundation, a nonprofit that Patel has said gives aid to a range of recipients, including the families of those charged in the Jan. 6 riot.

Some FBI personnel expressed frustration that the bureau’s leadership provided little guidance as rumors circulate widely about firings and about colleagues being escorted out of field offices. Driscoll’s email Friday night ended some of that confusion, though it confirmed some of their worst fears.

“Firing every agent who investigated cases from the Capitol riot will mean firing hundreds of agents across the country,” said Jason Manning, a former federal prosecutor who worked on Jan. 6 cases.

“It will mean firing agents who investigate child sex crimes, violent crimes, immigration crimes, Chinese espionage and lots of other criminal activity that President Trump claims to care about,” he added. “Our country is significantly weaker and more dangerous because of this.”

In a statement, Democratic lawmakers denounced the moves underway at the bureau and warned of the consequences.

“They are hollowing out our professional law enforcement community,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., who questioned Patel at the confirmation hearing. “It is the absolute height of arrogance to be doing exactly what their FBI nominee promised not to do.”

Trump once called the Jan. 6 riot a “heinous attack,” but in one of his first official acts, he granted sweeping clemency to all of the nearly 1,600 people charged in the assault. He issued pardons to most of the defendants and commuted the sentences of 14 members of the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers militia, most of whom were convicted of seditious conspiracy.

During Patel’s testimony Thursday, Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., told Patel that lawmakers would hold him accountable if he tried to exact revenge at the FBI, saying two wrongs did not make a right.

“And there have been and may still be some bad people there, and you’ve got to find out who the bad people are and get rid of them, in accordance with due process and the rule of law,” Kennedy said. “And then you’ve got to lift up the good people. Don’t go over there and burn that place down.”

The FBI has been in turmoil since Christopher Wray, the former director, stepped down before Trump took office. After Wray’s deputy abruptly resigned and shortly after Trump took office, the administration identified the wrong agent as acting director.

Instead of correcting the error, officials kept it in the hope that a new director would be quickly confirmed, The Wall Street Journal earlier reported.

Robert C. Kissane, who had been the top counterterrorism agent in New York, had been widely believed to be in line to be acting director, several current and former agents said, with Driscoll, a decorated agent in the FBI’s New York field office, as the No. 2. But when the White House unveiled its website after Trump was inaugurated, Driscoll was named in the top job.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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