UPDATE: FBI Agents Confirm Classified Documents FOUND At John Bolton’s Office During Raid Last Month

Former national security adviser John Bolton appears to be in hot water.

The FBI has announced that it discovered classified documents inside Bolton’s Washington, D.C., office during a raid last month.

According to reports, the classified documents discovered inside his office referenced weapons of mass destruction.

Newsweek provided more details on the discovery by the FBI:

FBI agents executing a court-authorized search of former national security adviser John Bolton’s Washington, D.C., office last month discovered documents marked as classified.

According to descriptions in court filings the inventory suggested the seized records included references to weapons of mass destruction, U.S. diplomatic work at the United Nations, and the government’s strategic communications efforts.

The discovery renews scrutiny of Bolton’s handling of sensitive national security information and echoes long-standing concerns first raised during a contentious legal battle over his 2020 memoir.

The discovery of classified documents in John Bolton’s office matters because it touches on the core question of whether senior national security officials are held to the same legal standards as others who handle sensitive material.

The case highlights concerns about protecting national defense information, the consistency of Justice Department enforcement in a series of high-profile document probes, and the political fallout of scrutinizing a prominent Trump-era official who later became one of the president’s sharpest critics.

FBI agents discovered classified documents at former national security adviser John Bolton’s Washington office last month, according to Politico. The records were obtained during an Aug. 22 search executed under a federal warrant. Court filings released… https://t.co/SarL4McJFK pic.twitter.com/Goiw6oLAwl

— The Western Journal (@WesternJournalX) September 24, 2025

Here are some scenes from the raid last month:

🚨New: Jesse Watters says the reason the FBI raided John Bolton’s home was over him allegedly taking millions of dollars from overseas:

“Primetime's hearing Bolton was making a lot of money from overseas and may have been trafficking in intelligence.” pic.twitter.com/jYJuPiiG9m

— The Calvin Coolidge Project (@TheCalvinCooli1) August 23, 2025

KOMO reported more details on the inventory list from the raid by the FBI:

The FBI wrote in an inventory list from the raid that at Bolton’s office that agents uncovered documents labeled confidential about weapons of mass destruction, confidential documents related the federal government’s strategic communications, a travel memo labeled “secret”, and confidential documents related to the United States mission to the United Nation. The heading of one set of “confidential” documents was redacted from the inventory.

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The federal government classifies its “classified documents” in three different categories: confidential, secret, and top secret. On that scale, “confidential” documents are deemed to have the least damaging impact to national security if released, and “top secret” information could have the most damaging impact.

Bolton’s lawyer Abbe Lowell shared to Politico that the “confidential” and “secret documents” seized by the FBI were not from Bolton’s time in the first Trump administration, but rather stem back from Bolton’s work in previous administrations. Lowell also said that Bolton had previously been granted permission to the documents.

“These materials, many of which are documents that had been previously approved as part of a pre-publication review for Amb. Bolton’s book, were reviewed and closed years ago,” Lowell said in a statement.

“These are the kinds of ordinary records, many of which are 20 years old or more, that would be kept by a 40-year career official who served at the State Department, as an Assistant Attorney General, the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, and the National Security Advisor,” Lowell continued. “Specifically, the documents with classification markings from the period 1998-2006 date back to Amb. Bolton’s time in the George W. Bush Administration,” Lowell added. “An objective and thorough review will show nothing inappropriate was stored or kept by Amb. Bolton.”

Typically, documents will be labeled “declassified,” the FBI’s inventory does not specify if any of the documents possessed this label.

Bolton and President Donald Trump publicly battled following the publication of Bolton’s book “The Room Where It Happened” in which he accused Trump was image-obsessed and that he was “unfit” for presidential office. It was revealed that in Bolton’s original manuscript, it included classified information. The Justice Department under the Biden administration led a probe into Bolton, but it did not lead to criminal charges.