Bolton arrives at court for classified information case

John Bolton arrived at a US federal courthouse for his first hearing on charges accusing the former Trump administration national security adviser of keeping top-secret records at home and sharing diary-like notes containing classified information with relatives.

Thursday’s 18-count federal indictment also alleges that classified information was compromised when agents believed to be affiliated with the Iranian government hacked Bolton’s email account and gained access to sensitive materials he shared.

Prosecutors said a Bolton representative told the FBI in 2021 that his emails had been hacked but did not disclose that Bolton had shared classified information through the account or that the hackers had government secrets.

He served for more than a year in Trump’s first administration before being fired in 2019.

The third case filed against Trump’s opponent in the past month will come against a backdrop of concerns that the Justice Department is pursuing the Republican president’s political enemies while shielding his allies from scrutiny.

“I have now become the latest target for the Department of Justice to be used as a weapon to indict those it views as its enemies,” Bolton said.

The indictment’s allegations are much more detailed than previous cases filed against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James.

Unlike cases filed by a hastily appointed U.S. attorney, Bolton’s indictment was signed by career national security prosecutors.

While the Bolton investigation came into public view in August when the FBI searched his home in Maryland and his office in Washington, the investigation was well underway when Trump took office in January.

The indictment alleges that Bolton shared more than 1,000 pages of information regarding his daily activities in the government with two relatives between 2018 and last August.

According to the indictment, the material included “diary-like” entries containing information classified as top secret that he had learned from conversations with other U.S. government officials, intelligence briefings or meetings with foreign leaders.

After sending a document, Bolton wrote a message to his relatives: “We are not talking about any of it!!!” In response, one of the relatives wrote “Shhh,” prosecutors said.

The indictment states that the shared materials included information about foreign enemies and, in some cases, revealed details about the sources and methods the government used to gather intelligence.

The two family members were not identified in court documents, but a person familiar with the case who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss details not publicly identified identified them as Bolton’s wife and daughter.

Bolton’s attorney, Abbe Lowell, said in a statement that “the facts underlying this case were investigated and resolved years ago.”

He said the charges stemmed from portions of Bolton’s personal diaries throughout his 45-year career in the government and contained declassified information shared only with his immediate family and known to the FBI until 2021.

“Like many public officials throughout history, Bolton kept a diary; this is not a crime,” Lowell said.

He said Bolton “did not illegally share or withhold any information.”

Bolton suggested that the criminal case was the result of a failed effort by the Justice Department after he left the government to block the publication of his 2020 book, The Room Where It Happened, which portrayed Trump as grossly misinformed about foreign policy.

The Trump administration has argued that Bolton’s draft contains classified information that could harm national security if disclosed.

Bolton’s lawyers said they made progress on the book after a White House National Security Council official with whom Bolton had been working for months said the draft no longer contained classified information.

Bolton was appointed in 2018 to serve as Trump’s third national security adviser.

Bolton later criticized Trump’s approach to foreign policy and government in his book; this includes claiming that Trump directly tied providing military aid to Ukraine to the country’s willingness to conduct investigations into Trump’s soon-to-be 2020 Democratic primary rival, Joe Biden, and members of Biden’s family.

Trump responded by accusing Bolton of being a “worn-out man” and a “crazy” warmonger who could drag the country into “World War Six.”