A former senior intelligence official who resigned in protest over the Iran war is under investigation by the FBI for allegedly leaking classified information, according to a source familiar with the matter.
The source told NBC News that the investigation before Joe Kent, a longtime Trump ally and retired Green Beret, announced his resignation Tuesday as director of the National Counterterrorism Center.
Semafor first reported the investigation.
Kent, who reported to Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, said Tuesday that he disagreed with the decision to go to war against Iran and that the regime did not pose “an imminent threat” as the Trump administration has asserted.
The FBI declined to comment. The White House and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday night.
In his first interview since resigning, Kent told Tucker Carlson on Wednesday that he expected there would be attempts to “discredit” him for his protest. But he said he would welcome a chance to speak to President Donald Trump.
“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,” Kent said. “I understand that, but I think the president is someone who listens.”
“And so I think he’s listening, not necessarily just to me and to you, but I think he is listening to a lot of different people, because I think he knows at a core level, this is not going well, and he needs to find a way for us to get out of this.”
Gabbard pushed back on Kent’s comments about the war in Iran, writing in a post on X that the president is responsible for determining what qualifies as an imminent threat. Her office acts to coordinate intelligence that provides Trump with the best information possible, Gabbard wrote Tuesday.
In a congressional hearing Wednesday, Gabbard declined to answer whether she believed Iran’s nuclear program presented an “imminent threat.”
