An agent described by House Republicans as an FBI whistleblower said that the bureau retaliated against him and left his family homeless.
The FBI’s leadership, Special Agent Garret O’Boyle alleged, retaliated against him after he was moved to the Virginia area from Kansas. He said that after the move, because of the alleged FBI actions against him, he and his family were rendered homeless after he was placed on unpaid suspension.
“As I testified, I had been selected for a new specialty unit in the Quantico region. And one night after we sold our house and had our youngest daughter and began to move across the country, when I reported for duty on that first day, I was promptly suspended,” O’Boyle told Fox News in a Monday interview. “And that is really when the retaliation began.”
The FBI has denied claims that the bureau retaliated against individuals who divulged internal information about the agency. The Epoch Times has contacted the FBI for comment regarding O’Boyle’s comments.
“The FBI’s mission is to uphold the Constitution and protect the American people. The FBI has not and will not retaliate against individuals who make protected whistleblower disclosures,” an FBI spokesperson said in a statement to multiple news outlets, including The Epoch Times, about the recent whistleblower disclosures.
In the latest interview, O’Boyle said he was stuck in a “purgatory-like state” while awaiting federal recourse and his family was figuring out what to do “day by day,” and he doesn’t plan on resigning. However, he offered a caveat: “I won’t be able to do this forever, but for now, we’re going to keep trying to fight the good fight and shine a light in the darkness that the FBI continues to try to hide.”
Last week, the House Judiciary’s Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government released a report saying that O’Boyle was reassigned to a different department, prompting him and his family to move to Virginia. When he arrived on the first day, he was placed on unpaid, indefinite suspension, effectively making his “family homeless” and depriving them of personal belongings, “including his young children’s clothing,” according to the report, which added that the clothing was kept in storage by the agency.
Their report alleged that his testimony reveals “that the FBI’s partisan leadership is currently engaging in a ‘purge’ of agents who hold conservative beliefs.” He also said Monday the FBI’s leadership is filled with “rot” and described the management as a “ten-headed snake.”
“I won’t hold my breath there because I’m sure they are going to ramp up the pressure to try to get rid of me even more now,” O’Boyle remarked. “But we’re just going to take it step by step, and trust in God’s providence for us and my family and for this nation.”
Last week, Democrats dismissed O’Boyle’s and the other whistleblower’s testimony, calling the hearing another attempt by Republicans on the committee to assist former President Donald Trump.
“This select committee is a clearinghouse for testing conspiracy theories for Donald Trump to use in his 2024 presidential campaign,” stated Rep. Stacey Plaskett (D-Virgin Islands), a non-voting member of the House who is the ranking member of the committee.
Another member of the committee, Rep. Daniel Goldman (D-N.Y.), a former House impeachment lawyer, questioned both Friend and O’Boyle about allegations of whether they received donations from former Trump official Kash Patel.
“My wife had lost her job and it was Christmastime. So I don’t think that accepting charity is something I was proud to do,” FBI Special Agent Stephen Friend said in response. “I think that any sort of allegation that I gave up a very lucrative career in order to accept a donation several months later from an individual who I’ve never met in my entire life is quite frankly laughable.”
While the FBI hasn’t issued a lengthy refutation to specific claims made by the whistleblowers, former FBI Assistant Director for Counterintelligence Frank Figliuizzi, a frequent critic of Trump, criticized Jordan and the whistleblowers in an MSNBC interview.
“What Jim Jordan was going to do was put out a fictional account, right, [that] these poor, pathetic employees have lost their jobs because they merely expressed contrary opinions to the deep state FBI,” he told the outlet. “In my 25 years at the bureau, including positions as chief inspector and a chief of an [Office of Professional Responsibility] internal affairs unit, I have never seen this much come out, and it shows the absolute disgrace that these employees have made of their roles and their missions.”
