Nine former FBI employees filed a federal lawsuit on Thursday, October 15, 2026, accusing the bureau and senior Justice Department officials of unlawfully dismissing them because they worked on the investigation into President Donald Trump's retention of classified documents after leaving the White House in 2021.
The complaint alleges the February 2026 firings were politically motivated and violated the employees' right to due process.
The 70-page complaint, filed in the U. S.
District Court for the District of Columbia, names the FBI, FBI Director Kash Patel, Attorney General Todd Blanche and the Department of Justice as defendants.
According to the lawsuit, eight employees were dismissed on February 26 and the ninth the following day, shortly before U.
S. and Israeli military strikes against Iran began on February 28.
The plaintiffs are Jennifer Bacon, Zach Feldman, Gilbert Granados, Catherine Herrera, Harrison Kaufman, Jeremy Linton, Erin Matanic, Danielle Ray and Rachel Vaccaro.
Their attorneys, Margaret Donovan, Abbe D. Lowell and Rebecca S.
Tinio, said the former employees collectively had more than a century of experience handling national security investigations and responding to major incidents, including the Boston Marathon bombing.
The complaint argues that the dismissals occurred without adequate notice, hearings, appeals or internal disciplinary proceedings.
It also challenges termination letters that accused the employees of poor judgment and a lack of impartiality, asserting that their work on the investigation did not establish misconduct.
The lawsuit alleges the employees were dismissed solely to serve the president's personal grievances.
"The plaintiffs were unlawfully terminated not for any cause or any legitimate reason, but only to satisfy the President's personal vendetta," the lawsuit states.
The complaint also disputes Patel's reported reliance on presidential executive authority to justify the dismissals, arguing that the employees were not given an opportunity to contest the decisions.
The plaintiffs further allege that the administration publicly questioned their integrity because of their involvement in investigations concerning Trump.
In a joint statement, the plaintiffs' attorneys defended their clients' professional records and said their work followed established investigative principles.
"In return for their service, they were fired because they did their jobs, as they always did, to follow the facts and the law without bias or favor," the attorneys said.
The lawsuit identifies a February 23 request for access to the classified documents investigation as a key event preceding the dismissals.
According to the complaint, FBI Special Agent Miles Starr, who served on Patel's Director's Advisory Team, sought urgent access to files associated with the investigation's codename, Plasmic Echo.
Jennifer Bacon, then chief of a counterintelligence section, granted Starr access to the case management system's files except for one specific subfile, the complaint says.
Those records included the names of all nine plaintiffs, and Bacon and the other employees were dismissed less than 48 hours later.
The filing also links the timing to criticism Patel faced after attending the Winter Olympics in Milan, Italy.
The lawsuit says a supervisor assigned to notify former special agent Zach Feldman speculated that the dismissal could be connected to news coverage of Patel's conduct with the U.
S. men's hockey team.
On February 25, Patel told Reuters that his phone records and those of White House chief of staff Susie Wiles had been subpoenaed as part of Smith's investigations.
Deputy Attorney General at the time of the firings, Blanche, had also publicly described the administration's personnel changes at the FBI as a housecleaning effort, according to the complaint.
The dispute stems from the classified documents investigation that began after FBI agents searched Trump's Mar-a-Lago property in Florida in August 2022.
Investigators recovered more than 100 documents bearing classified markings, according to the original case record.
In June 2023, special counsel Jack Smith charged Trump with offenses related to his alleged retention of classified records and efforts to obstruct the government's attempts to recover them.
The indictment alleged that the materials included sensitive information about U. S.
and foreign defense capabilities, nuclear programs, military vulnerabilities and potential retaliation plans.
Trump pleaded not guilty.
U. S.
District Judge Aileen Cannon dismissed the case after ruling that Smith had been unlawfully appointed special counsel.
The Justice Department later abandoned its appeal following Trump's victory in the 2024 presidential election.
The former employees say their dismissals also disrupted ongoing counterintelligence and counterterrorism investigations involving international threats.
The complaint alleges that their assignments were not properly transferred to replacement personnel, potentially affecting the continuity of sensitive national security work.
The plaintiffs are seeking reinstatement and back pay.
The FBI and Justice Department had not publicly responded to requests for comment reported by CBS News and NBC News.
The lawsuit follows a separate legal challenge filed earlier in 2026 by two former FBI special agents who disputed their dismissals over their limited roles in Arctic Frost, another investigation associated with Smith.
The Justice Department has sought to dismiss that case, which remains pending.
