He resigned in protest. Now the FBI wants to know what else he did on his way out the door.
Former National Counterterrorism Center Director Joe Kent tried to set the world on fire when he resigned his post, but now the Trump administration appears to be flipping the script.
While the FBI is not confirming anything, there are sources in DC that Kent is now under investigation for possibly leaking classified information, according to a breaking report on Semafor.
We have covered Kent’s resignation rather extensively on these pages, so I don’t want to rehash the entire letter. The focus, though, was on Trump falling for misinformation, the echo-chamber, and that Trump was pushed into this conflict by Israel.
The reason this is hitting so hard with the media is that Kent was considered MAGA when he was nominated, and he has an extensive resume as a special forces operator in the Army (he is a former Green Beret), including six Bronze Star awards, according to a recent profile of Kent in the Wall Street Journal.
When Kent claimed there was no imminent threat, Dan Bongino, the former deputy director of the FBI, pushed back. While on Fox News with Laura Ingraham, Bongino, in part, stated, "I read probably a lot more intelligence than he did, because they don't have a law enforcement function [at] the National Counterterrorism Center. They're an analytical clearinghouse.
"They're valuable. However, I had access to just about everything, and how you could come to the conclusion that the Israelis did it and there was no imminent threat here… really?"
Since leaving his post, Kent has been trying to do some damage control, but how he is going about it will not help him. He recently appeared on Tucker Carlson’s show, who has had a falling out with some factions of MAGA, including President Trump.
The Hill reported that Kent told Carlson that he had a conversation with Charlie Kirk, claiming that Kirk “looked me in the eye, and he said very loudly … Joe, stop us from getting into a war with Iran.”
He continued, “So when one of President Trump’s closest advisers who is vocally advocating for us to not go to war with Iran and at least rethink our relationship with Israel, and he’s suddenly publicly assassinated and we’re not allowed to ask questions, it’s a data point. A data point we need to look into.”
While he would not go so far as to say Israel was behind the assassination of Kirk, he did state, “But I’m saying there’s a lot of unanswered questions.” That is conspiracy theory nonsense, and he is only hurting his credibility by spewing his poison.
It turns out Kent may have gotten out before the knock on the door came, as Fox News is now reporting that its FBI sources are claiming that Kent is being investigated for a possible leak (the FBI declined to comment).
The sources told Fox News that this investigation predates Kent’s departure, just to put any claims by the left that this investigation is retribution for Kent coming forward on this matter. In fact, Kent hinted that he expected that, stating, "I understand the way I left and writing the letter that there's parts of this administration that are going to have to come after me and try and discredit me," reported NBC News.
In addition to Kent being a former Green Beret, he was also a CIA paramilitary officer and a Gold Star spouse, with his wife being tragically killed in an ISIS suicide bombing attack in Syria.
Right now, this is a loaded gun just waiting to go off against both sides. If the reports are false, it will look like the administration was trying to smear a decorated veteran. If the rumors are true, it will bring even more scrutiny to DNI Tulsi Gabbard and likely be the final straw that pushes her out the door.
