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John Bolton, who served as national security adviser to former President Donald Trump, pleaded guilty Friday to a single count of unlawfully retaining national security information from his time in the Trump administration.
Bolton entered the plea during a re-arraignment hearing Friday morning in Greenbelt, Maryland, before U.S. District Judge Theodore D. Chuang. Under the agreement, he faces a maximum prison sentence of up to 60 months and has agreed to pay a $2.25 million fine. Sentencing is scheduled for October 28.
Bolton was originally indicted in October 2025 on 18 counts: eight counts of transmission of national defense information and ten counts of retention of national defense information. The charges involved diary-like entries and records from his White House tenure that prosecutors said were improperly kept at his private residence.
Prosecutors alleged that Bolton shared more than 1,000 pages of material via his personal email account with two unauthorized individuals—reportedly his wife and daughter. Those transmission-related allegations were not included in the plea agreement.
According to the indictment, Bolton used personal email and messaging accounts to handle Top Secret intelligence concerning foreign adversaries, potential attacks, and U.S. foreign policy. He also allegedly retained classified files at his home, including sensitive information on foreign leaders and U.S. intelligence sources.
Bolton has described the material as an “electronic diary” that he shared only with immediate family members. His attorney, Abbe Lowell, previously maintained Bolton’s innocence, stating that the underlying facts had been investigated and resolved years earlier.
“These charges stem from portions of Amb. Bolton’s personal diaries over his 45-year career — records that are unclassified, shared only with his immediate family, and known to the FBI as far back as 2021,” Lowell said last year.
The case drew attention following an FBI raid on Bolton’s home, which uncovered additional details about the handling of the materials.
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