Three former FBI agents filed a class-action lawsuit against the bureau and justice department on Tuesday, along with the FBI director, Kash Patel, and attorney general, Pam Bondi, claiming they had been wrongfully terminated for working on the criminal cases related to Donald Trump.
The agents – Jamie Garman, Blaire Toleman and Michelle Ball – all worked on a public corruption squad in the FBI’s Washington field office and worked on investigations of Trump. All three were abruptly fired from the FBI last year.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Washington DC, seeks to represent all employees fired by the FBI since 1 January 2025, as well as those who may be terminated in the future, “on the basis of perceived political affiliation, without being afforded due process”. At least 50 former agents could be part of the proposed class, lawyers wrote in court papers.
Patel and Bondi have “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 lawsuit says. “Defendants’ mission – in their own words – is retribution.”
The justice department did not immediately return a request for comment.
Since taking office last year, Trump has moved aggressively to rid the FBI and justice department of lawyers and agents who worked on Jack Smith’s investigations without giving them a chance to even challenge those findings.
During a 3 March 2025 interview on Fox News, Bondi said there were “a lot of people in the FBI and also in the Department of Justice who despise Donald Trump, despise us, don’t want to be here”. “Right now, we’re going to root them out; we will find them, and they will no longer be employed,” she said.
That purge has caused deep alarm among longtime law enforcement officials and observers who say that the president is upending the longstanding political neutrality of the justice department and the FBI and politicizing the agencies. Several of those fired have filed similar wrongful termination suits that are working their way through the courts.
Two other fired agents who played small roles in the Trump investigations sued the bureau anonymously earlier this month for wrongful termination. Those agents filed their lawsuit under a pseudonym, saying that using their real names “would subject them and their families to an immediate risk of doxing, SWATting, harassment, and physical harm”.
Other agents suing the bureau for their firings include former top officials who resisted pressure to fire agents, a group of agents who kneeled during the George Floyd protests and an agent who was fired after displaying a Pride flag at his desk.
During an appearance at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Texas earlier this month, Todd Blanche, the deputy attorney general, bragged about the firings.
“There is not a single man or woman at the Department of Justice who had anything to do with those prosecutions,” he said.
