Well, good morning, and what have we here?!
An FBI cadre on Bolton’s front doorstep appeared!
🚨 IT’S HAPPENING: The FBI is CURRENTLY RAIDING the DC-area home of John Bolton
This deep state hack is FINALLY being taken down! 🔥
The raid, which was directly ordered by Kash Patel, seems to be related to classified documents
Perp walk him! pic.twitter.com/P498HkYtqc
— Nick Sortor (@nicksortor) August 22, 2025
And the ‘bustin’ through’ could be a bit dramatic. Word is the FBI may have knocked politely.
This is said to have been in relation to a national security probe that had been ongoing for some time, but was interrupted during the Biden years.
FBI agents raided the DC-area home of President Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton on Friday morning in a high-profile national security probe, The Post can exclusively reveal.
Federal agents went to Bolton’s house in Bethesda, Md., at 7 a.m. in an investigation ordered by FBI Director Kash Patel, a Trump administration official told The Post.
“NO ONE is above the law… @FBI agents on mission,” he said in a cryptic post to X shortly after the raid began.
Trump yanked Bolton’s security clearance and Secret Service protection earlier this year. The ‘Stache had already set up a retribution line, so expect that to come into the conversation almost immediately. Maybe he will hold a press conference to express his outrage sometime this afternoon. If he has a lawyer who tells him it’s okay, that is.
…Earlier this year, Trump pulled Bolton’s security clearance and Secret Service protection, drawing objections from some GOP senators like Tom Cotton of Arkansas.
After that action, Bolton eerily predicted he might face further action from Patel’s FBI.
“I think the central characteristic Trump seems to be looking for in all of the appointees we’ve seen so far is fealty to him,” he told the Christian Science Monitor in January. “A lot of people say it’s loyalty. Loyalty is a virtue, it’s a good thing. That’s not what Trump wants. He wants fealty to him. He wants submissiveness. He wants yes-men and yes-women. And Kash Patel has demonstrated, in his service in Trump’s first term, that he’ll simply do whatever Trump wants.
In response to a question in the interview about Patel, he said: “I don’t think he’s qualified,” Bolton told the Christian Science Monitor. “And if there is a retribution campaign, and there certainly seems to be, he would be a central element of it. I think that’s dangerous.”
But there’s long been talk and controversy over Bolton, the former Trump national security advisor turned fierce critic (after policy clashes caused the rupture), using his access to classified information in both his post-first Trump administration books and in public appearances. They had tried to shut down publication of Bolton’s book on the grounds that it contained unauthorized releases and classified information, but lost that case.
…Bolton has previously been accused of including classified information in his 2020 book, “The Room Where It Happened.”
President Trump fought to quash its publication over its inclusion of national secrets — saying Bolton broke an NDA signed as a condition of his employment — but was ultimately unsuccessful.
His first-term Justice Department opened an inquiry into the book in September 2020.
Professor Turley calls it ‘intriguing’ because these are ‘long-standing allegations,’ so does this mean that the current administration is picking up where the Biden administration scuttled the investigation? Or, even more interesting, has the continued rooting of Patel and the others through burn bags, hard drives, and hidden rooms turned up something new to rekindle this?
🚨 BREAKING: Legal expert Jonathan Turley says the FBI investigation into John Bolton could result in YEARS in prison, 10 or MORE, because it may involve national defense info.
Mr. Bolton is in some deep sht.
“It could be national defense information. That creates a heightened… pic.twitter.com/zflBikAvaP
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) August 22, 2025
Man. It makes you wonder.
Matt Taibbi at Racket had a few more nuggets on ties to Russiagate document releases, but also included a comment from a justice source that the raid and recent FBI whistleblower deals were not related.
…“It’s tied to classified documents,” a Justice Department official said this morning, adding it was an “investigation closed by Biden, reignited by Kash Patel.”
The Trump administration claims Bolton was denied permission by the National Security Council to publish the book. Bolton’s attorneys have denied that claim. Either way, the raid is a serious escalation. It underscores what Racket was told by a senior Trump official a month ago, that recent releases of documents related to Russiagate and other topics are not a “hearts and minds” campaign, but precursors to legal action.
Kind of weird, too. This is the first time Bongino’s come out of the woodwork in a while, which, taken with Taibbi’s info above, bodes badly for Bolton, I would think.
Public corruption will not be tolerated. https://t.co/VNzFdO6oVS
— Dan Bongino (@FBIDDBongino) August 22, 2025
This, too. TDS ages you badly, particularly if you’re so infected that your desperation to stay relevant goes into overdrive.
So weird to have watched John Bolton morph from Tea Party star on the right to whatever this is. pic.twitter.com/oylMN7sY9u
— FilmLadd (@FilmLadd) August 22, 2025
There’s so much that can come back to haunt Bolton if they found anything near what people have long suspected about this most vocal member of that group of Trump-hating, international war-hawking experts.
Especially when those like Bolton gloried in Trump’s own Mar-A-Lago humiliation, essentially saying he brought that on himself with his unique and oh, so ignorant brand of laissez-faire attitude towards handling classified material. I mean, listen to this arrogant sumbitch.
3 years ago, John Bolton raced to a TV studio to criticize President Trump over classified documents.
“I don’t think he cared about the classification system. I don’t think he appreciated the sensitivity of this information. … He liked cool things, he saw things that so he… https://t.co/JdnLBfilW2 pic.twitter.com/oojEbtann7
— Steve Guest (@SteveGuest) August 22, 2025
…he saw things that so he wanted to take them, and he was pretty much able to take them and not just on classified information matters, on all kinds of things that crossed his desk. Some days, he liked to eat a lot of french fries, some days days he took classified documents. He wanted them. Why did he want them? Because he could get them.”
Do Bolton’s thoughts apply to Bolton now?
Et tu, Johannes?
God dang. The guy is just a…you know.
Bolton wasn’t arrested, and there’s no word if they went through any underwear drawers, although there is an unconfirmed rumor that the former ambassador had to wait in the driveway in his skivvies while they tossed the place.
That’s probably too good to be true.
So none of the brutish ugliness of the Roger Stone or Mar-A-Lago type Biden-era home invasions, which shouldn’t surprise anyone.
Except for the people who made those happen. It should worry them exceedingly.
One of the first people CNN brings on to meltdown over the FBI raid on John Bolton’s house?
Andrew McCabe.
Ah-mazing.
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) August 22, 2025
As in maybe this isn’t a one-off.
Maybe it’s what’s known as a ‘good start.’
We can always hope.
Updates as they happen.
Our terrific HotAir VIP members are so important thanks to their support of our daily mission to bring you the best in conservative commentary. Ed, David, John, and I pride ourselves on the work we do every day to bring you our takes on all sorts of news, be it political, breaking, or just dang interesting
Stories from not only here at home, but from all over the world. We hope we inspire conversations and enable our HotAir readers to be informed and intrigued, always to learn a little more.
But we can’t fight the good fight without your help.
We would love to invite you join our tremendous VIP community. You can use the code FIGHT right now to join during the 60% off special – it’s a terrific opportunity to look into the VIP Gold and Platinum memberships.
We can’t thank you all enough for being here with us at HotAir!
