Speculation and anticipation have gripped the nation’s premier law enforcement agency over the future of one of its top leaders, FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino.
Bongino has quietly told confidants he plans to formally leave his job early in the new year and will not be returning to headquarters to work this month, according to eight people briefed on his account.
Bongino told his team and some senior FBI officials that he tentatively planned to announce his departure on Dec. 19, according to four people. Several people said some of Bongino’s personal effects have been cleared out of his office as of last week.
Bongino, a Trump ally and former Secret Service agent who built an enormous following as a conservative, pro-Trump radio and podcast host, was an unusual choice when President Donald Trump installed him in the post in February. He was the first deputy director in modern history who had no experience as an FBI agent. The deputy serves as the day-to-day operations chief of the agency.
Bongino has stayed mostly mum as media reports teased a departure that could come “as soon as this week” or possibly “in the near future.”
When reached by MS NOW, Bongino declined to confirm or deny the reports of his plans, adding, “Print whatever you’d like. No one believes you anyway. Thanks.”
The FBI had no comment.
With word of an impending departure has come speculation that Bongino is returning to podcasting, which reportedly made him worth $160 million.
In August, after Bongino privately sparred with Attorney General Pam Bondi, Trump took the unprecedented step of naming a co-deputy director to help share Bongino’s work, Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey. MS NOW reported last month that Trump and his White House aides have been weighing whether to remove FBI Director Kash Patel and replace him with Bailey in the new year.
Bongino expressed deep satisfaction earlier this month after the FBI arrested a suspect in the Jan. 6 pipe bombing case. He said he pressed the bureau to solve the case and got regular updates from the lead investigator. But the suspect’s identity refuted conspiracy theories he advanced on his podcast — and never publicly renounced once he got the job — asserting that the FBI had been covering up what it knew and that the planting of the bombs may have been an “inside job.”
Explaining his new thinking, Bongino said in an interview with Fox News Channel’s Sean Hannity that as a podcaster, he was paid to give his opinions, but now at the FBI, “I’m paid to be your deputy director, and we base investigations on facts.”
Bongino faced tremendous backlash from pro-Trump MAGA supporters related to the Jeffrey Epstein case, when he and fellow Justice Department leaders backtracked from earlier claims that the Epstein files contained a secret “client list” of prominent people that Epstein had kept as the fodder for potential blackmail. Before he joined the bureau, Bongino promoted MAGA conspiracy theories about the Epstein matter, suggesting there were things being hidden. “Listen, that Jeffrey Epstein story is a big deal, please do not let that story go. Keep your eye on this,” Bongino told his listeners in 2023. Bongino also suggested he had strong doubts about official government reports that Epstein had committed suicide in his jail cell. Once inside the bureau, however, Bongino said in a television interview that he had concluded there was no evidence Epstein was murdered. The Justice Department and FBI issued a joint memo in July saying the Epstein files contained no client list, and the furor it unleashed from the MAGA movement led to an angry confrontation between Bongino and Attorney General Bondi in July. Dec. 19 is the deadline by which the Justice Department is required to release investigative material related to Epstein, including unclassified records, documents and other communications, but can withhold those that would jeopardize other investigations or violate victims’ privacy, under the Epstein Files Transparency Act that Trump signed into law in November. Bongino has drawn disdain and ridicule from a wide swath of FBI agents. The bureau personnel generally lean conservative in their political viewpoints but also includes some progressives. But they tend to agree that Bongino is out of his depth as a leader of the bureau, multiple sources told MS NOW. “Agents are counting down the days,” one law enforcement source said of agents looking forward to Bongino’s departure.
Carol Leonnig is a senior investigative reporter with MS NOW.
Ken Dilanian is the justice and intelligence correspondent for MS NOW. Recommended
