Justice Department Indicts John Bolton on 18 Counts of Mishandling Classified Information

On October 16, 2025, a federal grand jury in Maryland indicted former national security adviser John Bolton on 18 counts of unlawfully retaining and transmitting classified national defense information. Prosecutors alleged that while serving in the first Trump administration Bolton sent diary-style entries containing classified material to two people who lacked security clearances, and that he retained classified documents after leaving government in 2019. The indictment followed an FBI search of Bolton's home in August 2025. Bolton was the third prominent Trump critic charged in 2025, after former FBI director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James, both indicted in the Eastern District of Virginia.

The charges are of a type the Justice Department has historically brought sparingly and against defendants across the political spectrum, which is why the pattern rather than the statute drew scrutiny: three of the administration's most prominent critics were charged within a month, in cases the president had publicly urged.

Bolton pleaded not guilty. Unlike the Comey and James cases, the Bolton prosecution was not dismissed on appointment-clause grounds and remained pending after November 2025.