前FBI探员起诉帕特尔和邦迪 称因2020大选调查遭解雇

Former FBI agents who worked on Trump 2020 election probe sue Patel and Bondi over their firing

March 31, 2026 / 10:45 AM EDT / CBS News

By Sarah N. Lynch

Sarah N. Lynch Senior Justice Department Reporter
Sarah N. Lynch is the senior Justice Department reporter for CBS News, based in Washington, D.C.

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A group of FBI agents is suing FBI Director Kash Patel, Attorney General Pam Bondi, the FBI and the Justice Department after they were terminated over their work on the investigation into Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

The three former agents — Jamie Garman, Blaire Toleman and Michelle Ball — were all seasoned investigators who primarily handled public corruption investigations and were assigned to special counsel Jack Smith’s team.

The lawsuit, filed in the D.C. U.S. District Court, names Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel as defendants. It is the second such lawsuit filed this month against the Justice Department by former FBI agents who were terminated over their work on the 2020 election probe, code named “Arctic Frost.”

“Defendants, the current Director of the FBI, Kashyap P. Patel, and Attorney General Pamela J. Bondi, have, since the beginning of 2025, embarked on a public campaign to oust Plaintiffs from federal service because Defendants perceived them to be political opponents—as if fidelity to the law and the proper execution of assignments were somehow hostile partisan acts,” the complaint alleges.

Spokespeople for the Justice Department and the FBI could not be immediately reached for comment.

Although there are only three named plaintiffs in the latest case, the lawsuit also represents a proposed class of other similarly situated former agents.

It estimates there are currently at least 50 former agents who were terminated in a similar way, and it says that number is expected to grow.

“Defendants have fired more than 50 FBI employees on the basis of their perceived political affiliation, without providing them any modicum of due process, and while disparaging their reputations and service in public statements around the time of the firings,” the lawsuit says.

The proposed class represents a group of employees that goes beyond just those who were fired for their work on Smith’s investigations into President Trump. It also includes others who were fired for different alleged political reasons that run the gamut from being wrongfully perceived to support the Black Lives Matter movement and displaying a LGBTQ pride flag, to having friendships with disfavored employees, being targeted by far-right media personalities and having internal messages flagged by an artificial intelligence review.

A number of former FBI agents who fit into some of the categories named in the lawsuit have already filed separate complaints against the department over their termination, including a handful of former agents who knelt during racial justice protests in 2020, in an effort to fend off potential violence after the death of George Floyd.

In the case of the Arctic Frost investigation, many of the former agents who worked on the probe were fired not long after the FBI released unredacted investigative materials to Congress.

The lawsuit also alleges that the FBI broke the law in releasing the materials, which were protected from disclosure by grand jury secrecy rules.

Disclosing grand jury material without permission from a court is a crime.

“Plaintiffs and the proposed class members no longer have access to the information necessary to rebut the false public charges against them. But even if they did, they still could not share it. Much of the relevant information is protected by grand jury secrecy rules and the Privacy Act, and it cannot be disclosed without incurring criminal or civil liability,” the lawsuit says.