Earlier this week, a federal grand jury convened to consider charges against Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton. Following his Thursday indictment, Bolton surrendered to authorities and entered his plea at the courthouse in Greenbelt, Maryland.
The Associated Press reported that Bolton, 76, pleaded not guilty in his initial court appearance following his Friday-morning surrender to authorities.
‘Weaponization of justice will not be tolerated, and this FBI will stop at nothing to bring to justice anyone who threatens our national security.’
Bolton is charged with eight counts of transmission of national defense information and 10 counts of unlawful retention of NDI, per a DOJ press release.
RELATED: Former national security adviser John Bolton indicted by federal grand jury
U.S. Attorney Thomas Sullivan, chief of the National Security and Cybercrime Section at the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Maryland.Photographer: Eric Lee/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Each count carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison.
Bolton, who was Trump’s national security adviser between April 2018 and September 2019, was allegedly in unauthorized possession of intelligence concerning “future attacks, foreign adversaries, and foreign policy relations,” according to the press release.
The indictment alleges that sometime in the period between September 2019 and July 2021, “a cyber actor believed to be associated with the Islamic Republic of Iran hacked Bolton’s personal email account and gained unauthorized access” to classified information.
The indictment also claims Bolton sent classified information in “diary-like entries” to two unnamed individuals, described as Bolton’s relatives, during his tenure as national security adviser in Trump’s first term.
Among the lurid details of Bolton’s exchanges with his relatives, the indictment gives the following account:
On or about July 23, 2018, Bolton sent Individuals 1 and 2 a message that stated, “More stuff coming!!!” A few minutes later, Bolton sent Individuals 1 and 2 a 24-page document which described information that Bolton learned while National Security Advisor. Less than three hours later, Bolton sent Individuals 1 and 2 a follow-up messaged that stated, “None of which we talk about!!!” In response, Individual 1 sent a message that stated, “Shhhhh.” Individual 2 then sent a message that stated, “The only interesting thing is what [senior U.S. Government official] might have said from [foreign language] interpreter, which you didn’t tell us…”
Approximately two minutes later, Individual 1 sent a message in response that stated, “More to come with cloak and dagger…or something. So he says…”
The descriptions in the indictment list each document as “secret” or “top secret,” among other intelligence classifications.
The section that discusses Bolton’s exchanges with these two individuals ends by saying: “Bolton left the messaging chat group with Individuals 1 and 2 that he had used to send them more than a thousand pages of notes memorializing his time as National Security Advisor.”
In the press release, FBI Director Kash Patel stated, “The case was based on meticulous work from dedicated career professionals at the FBI who followed the facts without fear or favor. Weaponization of justice will not be tolerated, and this FBI will stop at nothing to bring to justice anyone who threatens our national security.”
ABC News reported that Judge Thomas Sullivan set a November 14 deadline for pretrial motions to be filed in the case and set a scheduling conference for November 21.
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