Nine former FBI employees have filed a 70-page lawsuit in federal court, alleging they were fired because they worked on Jack Smith’s classified-records investigation involving President Trump. The complaint says the firings lacked an internal investigation, notice, a hearing or an opportunity to appeal, and it cites a request for access to case files shortly before the dismissals. Those claims have not been tested in court, and the Justice Department and FBI had been contacted for comment. The filing names the bureau, FBI Director Kash Patel, Attorney General Todd Blanche and the Justice Department as defendants; no court schedule or ruling is reported.
TLDR: The former employees allege that their February dismissals were tied to their work on the classified-records investigation and bypassed normal disciplinary steps. Their lawsuit is pending in federal court, with no reported ruling or hearing date.
Nine former FBI employees filed a lawsuit Thursday in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, alleging they were unlawfully fired because they worked on former special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into President Donald Trump’s retention of classified records. The plaintiffs include former special agents, intelligence analysts and staff operations specialists who worked on counterintelligence matters. The suit names the FBI, FBI Director Kash Patel, Attorney General Todd Blanche and the Justice Department as defendants. The allegations have not been tested in court, and the excerpt provides no response from the defendants.
The lawsuit’s stated rationale is that the firings lacked a legitimate employment basis and were driven by political animus. Its attorneys allege the employees were dismissed for their connection to the records investigation, not for misconduct or another proper cause. The filing says the bureau conducted no internal investigation or disciplinary process before the dismissals. It also alleges the employees received no notice, hearing or opportunity to appeal, and that Patel relied on Article II of the Constitution to support the action.
The nine employees were fired over two days in February 2026. Eight were dismissed on the same day, and the ninth the following day. The lawsuit places the firings amid other changes at the bureau and a growing number of legal challenges brought by former FBI personnel who say they were abruptly terminated. Blanche, who was deputy attorney general when the employees were let go, had publicly described the administration as having “cleaned house” at the FBI by firing employees associated with investigations involving the president, according to the report.
The filing also gives an account of events involving counterintelligence section chief Jennifer Bacon. It says Miles Starr, a member of Patel’s Director’s Advisory Team, requested access to files from the classified-records investigation, known internally as Plasmic Echo. On February 23, Starr emailed Assistant Director Roman Rozhavsky seeking urgent access, the lawsuit says, but did not explain what he needed. Starr said he was acting on Patel’s instructions, according to the filing.
Bacon granted Starr access to the Plasmic Echo files in the FBI’s case management system, except for one specific subfile, the suit says. The files he could access contained the names of all nine plaintiffs. Less than 48 hours later, Bacon and the other employees were fired, according to the complaint. The filing presents the sequence as part of its account of the dismissals; it does not establish on its own that the file request caused them.
The complaint further points to public remarks and events involving Patel as evidence for the plaintiffs’ account. It says Patel’s conduct at the Winter Olympics in Milan drew criticism and describes a special agent in charge as having speculated that one employee’s firing might be related to news reports about Patel. Those assertions are allegations in the lawsuit, not independent findings. The filing also says Patel disclosed in a February 25 Reuters interview that his phone records and those of White House chief of staff Susie Wiles had been subpoenaed in Smith’s investigations; eight plaintiffs were fired that day, the suit says.
The underlying classified-records case is separate from the employees’ employment lawsuit. FBI agents searched Mar-a-Lago in August 2022 under a warrant and allegedly recovered more than 100 documents bearing classified markings. Smith’s office indicted Trump in 2023 on more than three dozen charges tied to the alleged retention of the records and efforts to obstruct the government’s attempts to recover them. A federal judge dismissed the charges, ruling that Smith had been unlawfully appointed special counsel, and the Justice Department abandoned its appeal after Trump won the 2024 election.
The practical impact described so far is limited to the nine former employees and the filing of their 70-page complaint. They are seeking legal relief over the terminations, though the excerpt does not specify the remedies requested, any filing fees, a response deadline, or a hearing date. The lawsuit alleges that ordinary internal safeguards—including notice, a hearing, an investigation and an appeal—were not provided before the firings. No court ruling on those claims is reported, and the Justice Department and FBI had been contacted for comment.
The case now proceeds through the federal court process, but the excerpt does not report a schedule for the next filing or hearing. The court’s review will address the claims and the government’s response as they become part of the record. Those are the necessary next steps for assessing the dispute and ensuring that the legal process is followed.
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