Ex-national security adviser John Bolton charged in classified information probe

John Bolton is a former national security adviser (Michael Dwyer/AP)

Former Trump administration national security adviser John Bolton has been charged with storing top secret records at home and sharing with relatives diary-like notes about his time in government that contained classified information.

The 18-count indictment also suggests classified information was exposed when operatives believed linked to the Iranian regime hacked Mr Bolton’s email account in 2021 and gained access to secrets he had shared.

A Bolton representative told the FBI his emails had been hacked, prosecutors say, but did not reveal that he had shared classified information through the account or that the hackers now had possession of this information.

The investigation into Mr Bolton, who served for more than a year in President Donald Trump’s first administration before being fired in 2019 and emerging as an outspoken critic of the Republican leader, burst into public view in August when the FBI searched his home in Maryland and his office in Washington for classified records he may have held on to from his years in government.

The 18-count indictment, filed in federal court in Greenbelt, Maryland, sets the stage for a closely watched court case centring on a long-time fixture in Republican foreign policy circles who became known for his hawkish views on American power and who after leaving Mr Trump’s first government emerged as a prominent and vocal critic of the president.

John Bolton served for more than a year in President Donald Trump’s first administration before being fired in 2019 (PA)

Though the investigation that produced the indictment was under way during Joe Biden’s administration and began well before Mr Trump’s second term, the case will unfold against the backdrop of broader concerns that his Justice Department is being weaponised to go after his political adversaries and to spare his allies from scrutiny.

The indictment alleges that Mr Bolton “abused” his position as national security adviser by sharing more than 1,000 pages of information about “his day-to-day activities” in his job with two people who were related to him and who were not authorised to view them.

He also is accused of illegally retaining at his Maryland home “documents, writings, and notes” related to national defence, including information that was classified up to the top secret level, the indictment says.

Agents during the August search seized multiple documents labelled “classified”, “confidential” and “secret” from Mr Bolton’s office, according to previously unsealed court filings.

Some of the seized records appeared to concern weapons of mass destruction, national “strategic communication” and the US mission to the United Nations, the filings stated.

It follows separate indictments over the last month accusing former FBI director James Comey of lying to Congress and New York attorney general Letitia James of committing bank fraud and making a false statement, charges they both deny.

Both of those cases were filed in federal court in Virginia by a prosecutor Mr Trump hastily installed in the position after growing frustrated that investigations into high-profile enemies had not resulted in prosecution.

The Bolton case, by contrast, was filed in Maryland by a US attorney who before being elevated to the job had been a career prosecutor in the office.

Questions about Mr Bolton’s handling of classified information date back years. He faced a lawsuit and a Justice Department investigation after leaving office related to information in a 2020 book he published, The Room Where It Happened, that portrayed Mr Trump as grossly uninformed about foreign policy.

The Trump administration asserted that Mr Bolton’s manuscript included classified information that could harm national security if exposed.

Questions about John Bolton’s handling of classified information date back years (Michael Dwyer/AP)

Mr Bolton’s lawyers have said he moved forward with the book after a White House National Security Council official, with whom Mr Bolton had worked for months, said the manuscript no longer contained classified information.

A search warrant affidavit that was previously unsealed said a National Security Council official had reviewed the book manuscript and told Mr Bolton in 2020 that it appeared to contain “significant amounts” of classified information, some at a top-secret level.

Mr Bolton’s lawyer, Abbe Lowell, has said that many of the documents seized in August had been approved as part of a pre-publication review for Bolton’s book.

He said that many were decades old, from Mr Bolton’s long career in the State Department, as an assistant attorney general and as the US ambassador to the United Nations.

The indictment is a dramatic moment in Bolton’s long career in government. He served in the Justice Department during president Ronald Reagan’s administration and was the State Department’s point man on arms control during George W Bush’s presidency.

Mr Bolton was nominated by Mr Bush to serve as US ambassador to the United Nations, but the strong supporter of the Iraq war was unable to win Senate confirmation and resigned after serving 17 months as a Bush recess appointment. That allowed him to hold the job on a temporary basis without Senate confirmation.

In 2018, Mr Bolton was appointed to serve as Mr Trump’s third national security adviser. But his brief tenure was characterised by disputes with the president over North Korea, Iran and Ukraine.

Those rifts ultimately led to Mr Bolton’s departure, with Mr Trump announcing on social media in September 2019 that he had accepted Mr Bolton’s resignation.

Mr Bolton subsequently criticised Mr Trump’s approach to foreign policy and government in his 2020 book, including by alleging that Mr Trump directly tied providing military aid to the country’s willingness to conduct investigations into Mr Biden, who was soon to be Mr Trump’s Democratic 2020 election rival, and members of his family.

Mr Trump responded by slamming Mr Bolton as a “washed-up guy” and a “crazy” warmonger who would have led the country into “World War Six”. Mr Trump also said at the time that the book contained “highly classified information” and that Mr Bolton “did not have approval” for publishing it.