Donald Trump’s administration is expected to soon fire “dozens” of FBI agents who probed him and those involved in the Jan. 6, 2021, incident at the U.S. Capitol.
The would-be purge may be carried out as soon as Friday, CNN reports, less than two weeks into the 78-year-old’s second White House term.
Trump repeatedly raged against the FBI and Justice Department while out of office, alleging they were weaponized against him by Joe Biden and Democrats.
Among Trump’s biggest gripes was how the FBI carried out a raid at Mar-a-Lago in 2022, during which his Florida estate was inspected—and photographed—by dozens of agents who arrived unannounced.
Those agents were seeking proof that Trump was still in possession of classified material from his first stint in the White House. Trump was indicted after the raid, but the case was dropped after he won last year’s election.
Now, the federal agents involved in that probe may soon find themselves out of a job.
Interim leaders in the DOJ spent this week making a list of agents “whose work at the bureau has earned disfavor with Trump for a variety of reasons,” CNN reported.
The network added the agents who find themselves in the president‘s alleged black book “may be asked to resign or face termination.”
If true, Trump’s cleaning house at the FBI would be eerily similar to what his team pulled off at the Justice Department last week, which included mass resignations and reassignments.
The forthcoming FBI purge won’t be limited to individual agents, CNN reports. At least six senior leaders have also been ordered to “retire, resign, or be fired by Monday.”
These moves come as Trump’s controversial nominee to lead the bureau, Kash Patel, is still facing confirmation by the Senate. He will be replacing Christopher Wray—a lifelong Republican whom Trump appointed during his first term but grew to hate well before he was being probed by the bureau.
The FBI Agents Association reacted to the expected firings in a statement to CNN.
“If true, these outrageous actions by acting officials are fundamentally at odds with the law enforcement objectives outlined by President Trump and his support for FBI Agents,” the nonprofit wrote. “Dismissing potentially hundreds of Agents would severely weaken the Bureau’s ability to protect the country from national security and criminal threats and will ultimately risk setting up the Bureau and its new leadership for failure.”
