President Donald Trump is moving to fire FBI officials who were involved in criminal investigations of him, reported the Associated Press on Friday.
While it is not immediately clear how many agents will be affected by the move, "officials acting at the direction of the administration were working to identify individual agents who could be terminated, said the people who insisted on anonymity to discuss private conversations," said the report.
According to NBC News, one official who has already been notified of impending termination is David Sundberg, head of the Washington FBI Field Office. Sundberg was put in charge by former FBI Director Christopher Wray, himself a Trump appointee from the previous term.
The Washington Field Office was involved closely in working with special counsel Jack Smith on the criminal investigation of Trump's effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
This comes after Trump moved to fire career prosecutors in the Justice Department who were likewise involved with those cases — a highly unusual move, as normally the only officials who are changed out with new administrations are U.S. attorneys, not the career prosecutors underneath them.
It also comes as Trump pushes MAGA loyalist Kash Patel to serve as the new FBI director, in spite of his extensive enemies lists and his threats to criminally target journalists.
