In October 2025, a federal grand jury in Maryland returned an eighteen count indictment against John Bolton, charging that he illegally kept and shared classified information while writing his memoir. According to the indictment, Bolton sent emails that contained information that appeared to have come from classified documents he had access to while serving as national security adviser during the first Trump administration. The emails, which were sent using an unsecured account, were hacked by the government of Iran, the indictment stated. Bolton initially pleaded not guilty, but on June 26, 2026, he pleaded guilty to one count of possessing sensitive material as part of an agreement with prosecutors that he would face no more than five years in prison.
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