Trump critic John Bolton pleads guilty in classified documents case
The former Trump national security adviser, later a fierce critic of the president, admitted to illegally retaining classified information
Former Trump national security adviser John Bolton pleaded guilty on Friday to illegally keeping classified information, resolving a federal case that grew out of an investigation into materials he retained after leaving government.
Bolton, who became one of Donald Trump’s most prominent Republican critics after serving in his first administration, is due to be sentenced on October 28 in federal court in Greenbelt, Maryland.
The charges against Bolton stemmed from diary-style notes and other sensitive materials that prosecutors said he shared with relatives while working on a memoir about his years in government. He had originally faced 18 counts related to retaining or transmitting classified information.
Federal agents searched Bolton’s Maryland home and Washington office last August, though the investigation began before Trump returned to the White House in January 2025.
Bolton served as Trump’s national security adviser for more than a year before leaving the administration in 2019. He later published The Room Where It Happened, a sharply critical account of Trump’s presidency that the administration unsuccessfully sought to block, arguing it contained classified material.
Trump has repeatedly attacked Bolton, calling him a warmonger and deriding him as “crazy.”