By ERIC TUCKER, ALANNA DURKIN RICHER and MICHAEL KUNZELMAN Associated Press
GREENBELT, Md. (AP) — John Bolton, who served as national security adviser to President Donald Trump during his first term and later became a vocal critic of the Republican leader, was charged Thursday with storing top secret records at home and sharing with relatives diary-like notes about his time in government that officials said contained classified information.
The 18-count indictment also suggests classified information was exposed when operatives believed linked to the Iranian regime hacked Bolton’s email account in 2021 and gained access to sensitive material he had shared. A Bolton representative told the FBI at the time that his emails had been hacked, prosecutors say, but did not reveal he had shared classified information through the account or that the hackers now had possession of government secrets.
The indictment sets the stage for a closely watched court case centering on a longtime fixture in Republican foreign policy circles who became known for his hawkish views on American power and who served for more than a year in Trump’s first administration before being fired in 2019 and publishing a scathingly critical book about the president.
Bolton is now the third Trump adversary prosecuted in the last month, meaning the case will unfold against the backdrop of concerns the president is using his Justice Department to pursue political enemies and to spare allies from scrutiny. Bolton foreshadowed that argument in a defiant statement Thursday in which he denied the charges and called them part of an “intensive effort” by Trump to “intimidate his opponents.”
“Now, I have become the latest target in weaponizing the Justice Department to charge those he deems to be his enemies with charges that were declined before or distort the facts,” he said.
Even so, the indictment is significantly more detailed in its allegations than earlier cases against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James. Unlike the other two cases that were filed by a hastily appointed U.S. attorney, this one was signed by career national security prosecutors. And though the investigation burst into public view in August when the FBI searched Bolton’s home in Maryland and his office in Washington, the inquiry was already well underway by the time Trump took office a second time this past January.
Sharing of classified secrets
The indictment, filed in federal court in Greenbelt, Maryland, alleges that between 2018 and this past August Bolton shared with two relatives more than 1,000 pages of information about his day-to-day activities in government.
The material included “diary-like” entries with information classified as high as top secret that he had learned from meetings with other U.S. government officials, from intelligence briefings or talks with foreign leaders, according to the indictment. After sending one document, Bolton wrote in a message to his relatives, “None of which we talk about!!!” In response, one of his relatives wrote, “Shhhhh,” prosecutors said.
Among the material was information about foreign adversaries that in some cases revealed details about sources and methods used by the government to collect intelligence. One document related to a foreign adversary’s plans for a missile launch, while another detailed U.S. government plans for covert action and included intelligence blaming an adversary for an attack, court papers say.
The two family members were not identified in court papers, but a person familiar with the case who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss non-public details identified them as his wife and daughter.
“There is one tier of justice for all Americans,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement. “Anyone who abuses a position of power and jeopardizes our national security will be held accountable. No one is above the law.”
The indictment also suggests Bolton was aware of the impropriety of sharing classified information with family and friends, citing an April news media interview in which he chastised Trump administration officials for using Signal to discuss sensitive military details. Though the anecdote is meant by prosecutors to show Bolton understood the law surrounding government secrets, Bolton’s legal team may also try to point to it to argue a double standard in enforcement since the Justice Department is not known to have opened any investigation into the Signal episode.
Bolton’s attorney, Abbe Lowell, said in a statement that the “underlying facts in this case were investigated and resolved years ago.”
He said the charges stem from portions of Bolton’s personal diaries over his 45-year career and included unclassified information that was shared only with his immediate family and was known to the FBI as far back as 2021.”
“Like many public officials throughout history, Amb. Bolton kept diaries — that is not a crime. We look forward to proving once again that Amb. Bolton did not unlawfully share or store any information,” Lowell said.
Controversy over a book
Bolton linked the criminal case to an an unsuccessful Justice Department effort, after he left government, to block the publication of his 2020 book “The Room Where It Happened.”
The Trump administration asserted that Bolton’s manuscript, which portrayed Trump as grossly misinformed about foreign policy, contained classified information that could harm national security if exposed. 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.
A search warrant affidavit that was previously unsealed said a National Security Council official had reviewed the book manuscript and told Bolton in 2020 that it appeared to contain “significant amounts” of classified information, some at a top-secret level.
“These charges are not just about his focus on me or my diaries, but his intensive effort to intimidate his opponents, to ensure that he alone determines what is said about his conduct,” he said.
Bolton also served in the Justice Department during President Ronald Reagan’s administration and was the State Department’s point man on arms control during George W. Bush’s presidency. Bolton was nominated by Bush to serve as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, but the strong supporter of the Iraq war was unable to win Senate confirmation and resigned after serving 17 months as a Bush recess appointment. That allowed him to hold the job on a temporary basis without Senate confirmation.
In 2018, Bolton was appointed to serve as Trump’s third national security adviser. But his brief tenure was characterized by disputes with the president over North Korea, Iran and Ukraine.
Those rifts ultimately led to Bolton’s departure, with Trump announcing on social media in September 2019 that he had accepted Bolton’s resignation. Bolton subsequently criticized Trump’s approach to foreign policy and government in his 2020 book, including by alleging that Trump directly tied providing military aid to Ukraine to that country’s willingness to conduct investigations into Joe Biden, who was soon to be Trump’s Democratic 2020 election rival, and members of his family.
Trump responded by slamming Bolton as a “washed-up guy” and a “crazy” warmonger who would have led the country into “World War Six.” Trump also said at the time that the book contained “highly classified information” and that Bolton “did not have approval” for publishing it.
___
Tucker and Durkin Richer reported from Washington.