FBI fires, unfires, refires agents linked to Jack Smith probe

At least two FBI employees involved in former investigations into President Donald Trump were told on Monday that they had been fired, only to learn later in the day that those terminations had been reversed or put on hold, according to six people familiar with the decisions.

Then on Tuesday morning, those two employees learned they had indeed been fired, along with two other employees, according to three of the people familiar with the decisions.

The chaotic process highlights the continued turmoil and uncertainty across federal law enforcement amid overhauls at the Justice Department and FBI that have targeted those who helped secure indictments against Trump or are viewed by the president as aligned with his political enemies.

The targeted FBI special agents were tied to either special counsel Jack Smith’s probe or the initial investigation into Trump that began in 2022 and that the FBI had dubbed “Arctic Frost.”

An FBI spokesperson declined to comment, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia did not respond to a request comment.

The FBI Agents Association, which represents the interests of FBI employees, criticized the actions against the four FBI employees in a statement to NBC News, casting them as part of “a campaign of erratic and arbitrary retribution” led by FBI Director Kash Patel.

“The actions yesterday — in which FBI Special Agents were terminated and then reinstated shortly after, and then only to be fired again today – highlight the chaos that occurs when long-standing policies and processes are ignored,” the statement said. “An Agent simply being assigned to an investigation and conducting it appropriately within the law should never be grounds for termination.”

The turmoil on Monday and Tuesday followed separate terminations or departures at the FBI and Justice Department last week. Two prosecutors who mentioned the events of Jan. 6 in a sentencing memo were placed on administrative leave.

On Thursday Patel also dismissed Steven Palmer, a 27-year veteran of the FBI who in part oversaw the agency’s use of government planes and led the bureau’s critical incident response group, according to one of the six people familiar with the decisions.

Bloomberg first reported Palmer’s firing. NBC News has not confirmed the reason for Palmer’s firing.

Recently, the FBI has fired employees linked to investigators’ decision to obtain phone call records of nine Republican U.S. senators as they examined Trump’s attempt to overturn his 2020 election loss.

Aaron Tapp, the Special Agent in Charge of the San Antonio field office, was pushed out after his name appeared in internal documents recently released by Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, in connection with the FBI’s analysis of the phone data, according to one of the six people familiar with the decisions.

Tapp declined to comment.

The overhaul began within days of Trump taking office in January, when the Justice Department fired several career lawyers involved Smith’s probe.

Brian Driscoll, a former FBI official who drew national attention after refusing a Justice Department directive to hand over a list of agents who had worked on cases tied to the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riot, was also fired in August.

And NBC News reported last month that the FBI punished three agents who worked in connection with Smith’s probe or the Arctic Frost investigation, including dismissing at least two of them.