John Bolton Indicted on 18 Counts Over Classified Information

John Bolton, the former U.S. national security adviser and later critic of President Donald Trump, was indicted Thursday by a federal grand jury in Maryland on charges alleging mishandling of classified information and surrendered to authorities on Friday in Greenbelt, Maryland, court records show. The 18-count indictment accuses Bolton of eight counts of unlawfully transmitting national defense information and 10 counts of retaining classified material after his White House service.

Prosecutors say the case centers on diarylike notes and messages that contained classified details from Bolton's time as national security adviser and that he sent some of that material to two relatives and others who were helping him prepare a 2020 memoir. FBI agents searched Bolton's Maryland home and his Washington office in August, seizing documents that court filings described as labeled classified, confidential and secret. The indictment further alleges that a foreign actor believed to be associated with Iran hacked a Bolton personal email account in 2021, and that Bolton did not disclose to the FBI that he had shared classified information via that account or that the hackers might possess it.