Overview

• News reports based on anonymous sources say roughly 15 to 22 employees were terminated, with the FBI declining to comment on the specific dismissals.
• The union says more than a dozen of those fired include military veterans who have additional job protections under federal law.
• Several of the affected agents were reassigned within the bureau in spring 2023 after being photographed kneeling during Black Lives Matter protests in Washington in 2020.
• Sources say some agents knelt to defuse tensions rather than to make a political statement, a point that had been debated inside the bureau at the time.
• The actions follow broader personnel changes under Director Kash Patel as former senior officials, including ex-acting director Brian Driscoll, pursue a lawsuit alleging unlawful retaliation.