An FBI special agent notified Congress on Thursday that the top brass at the bureau removed him from his job in retaliation for defending a fellow whistleblower.
The agent, an attorney who worked as an adjudicator investigating misconduct within the FBI, said his superiors turned on him when he recommended ending the suspension of FBI agent Garrett O’Boyle.
Mr. O’Boyle has been at the center of a whistleblower saga since his security clearance was suspended in September 2022 for allegedly leaking information about a criminal investigation into Project Veritas.
The suspension without pay, which the FBI imposed after Mr. O’Boyle testified before the House Judiciary Committee’s panel on weaponization of the federal government, left him and his family financially ruined and homeless after the FBI yanked his security clearance and suspended him without pay.
The FBI adjudicator, who worked in the Security Division, known in the bureau as “SecD,” reviewed the O’Boyle case and recommended lifting the suspension and reinstating Mr. O’Boyle as an agent. The adjudicator said the FBI lacked specific information to support the suspended Mr. O’Boyle.
According to the new whistleblower disclosure to Congress, FBI Acting Section Chief Dena Perkins quickly revoked the adjudicator’s finding and transferred him to another post.
The disclosure claimed it was “not the first time. … Ms. Perkins has moved several other employees who report to her for recommending decisions contrary to her interests [and] bases many of her decisions on favoritism.”
The Washington Times reviewed a copy of the disclosure.
It also said that Ms. Perkins’ supervisors refuse to address this issue.
“Perkins who was the acting [Senior Executive Service] Section Chief in SecD for an extended period of time is considered corrupt and dishonest by FBI employees,” the FBI agent said in the whistleblower disclosure.
The FBI did not respond to a request for comment for this story.
The FBI previously denied the agency retaliates against its employees “for exercising their First Amendment rights or for their political views; to allege otherwise is false and misleading.”
The FBI previously said of Mr. O’Boyle’s case: “The FBI is required to follow established policies and procedures, to include a thorough investigation when suspending or revoking a security clearance.”
Another FBI whistleblower disclosure sent to Congress in November said FBI supervisor Sean Clark and Ms. Perkins were behind the punishment of Mr. O’Boyle.
They allegedly transferred him across the country with the intent to suspend and financially devastate him.
“Clark bragged to at least one other FBI employee in SecD that he was going to really ’screw’ O’Boyle,” said the disclosure, which The Times reviewed.
“At the time, the Security Division suspended FBI employee Garret O’Boyle, the supervisor in charge of O’Boyle’s Case, Sean Clark, had already determined that O’Boyle did not provide any information to either Project Veritas or the press,” it said.
“SecD was operating under the theory that O’Boyle had provided the information to another FBI employee who then passed it on to an entity outside the FBI,” it said. “However, SecD did not conclusively know how the information was passed to Project Veritas or the press.”
Mr. Clark and Ms. Perkins allowed Mr. O’Boyle, who was unaware he was under an internal investigation, to sell his home and move to the other office. Upon arriving at his new office, he was suspended immediately, the disclosure said.
“O’Boyle and his family were left homeless. The FBI had possession of all of Mr. O’Boyle’s and his family’s personal effects, including clothes and furniture,” the disclosure said. “No one in SecD took any steps to assist O’Boyle from the desperate predicament that SecD created. SecD caused O’Boyle, who was still an FBI employee, to be left destitute in a city [where] he had no family or support.”
• Kerry Picket can be reached at kpicket@washingtontimes.com.
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