Joe Kent, who recently stepped down as the director of the National Counterterrorism Center in protest against the ongoing conflict with Iran, is under FBI investigation for allegedly leaking classified information, according to a source familiar with the situation.
The investigation, first reported by Semafor on Wednesday, began prior to Kent’s abrupt exit from the Trump administration.
Further details have not been disclosed at this time.
The investigation was made public just a day after former White House deputy chief of staff Taylor Budowich took to X to criticize Kent, describing him as “a crazed egomaniac often at the center of national security leaks, while rarely (never?) producing any actual work.”
Budowich further commented, “This isn’t some principled resignation,” implying that Kent sought to make a significant impact before being dismissed. “What a loser,” he added.
In his resignation letter, Kent argued that Iran did not pose an immediate threat to the United States and claimed that Trump initiated Operation Epic Fury due to pressure from Israel and its influential American supporters.
Kent, who has run twice for Congress as a Republican, elaborated on these assertions during an interview with podcaster Tucker Carlson released on Wednesday night. He accused conservative media figures like Mark Levin and Sean Hannity of echoing Israeli narratives about Iran’s uranium enrichment reaching nuclear weapon capabilities.
He stated, “Yet, if you looked in classified intelligence, we didn’t see any of that.” He described the circle around President Trump as “very, very tight and very small,” suggesting they were aligned and possibly influenced by the information ecosystem he described.
Kent also noted that although there was “robust debate and robust discussions” before Trump targeted three Iranian nuclear sites in June 2025, the decision-making for Operation Epic Fury was limited to a few key advisers around the president.
President Trump responded to Kent’s resignation on Tuesday, expressing to reporters in the Oval Office, “I always thought he was a nice guy, but I always thought he was weak on security, very weak on security.”
“When I read the statement, I realized that it’s a good thing that he’s out, because he said that Iran was not a threat,” Trump continued. “Iran was a threat. Every country realized what a threat Iran was.”
The president further stated, “When somebody is working with us that says they didn’t think Iran was a threat, we don’t want those people … They’re not smart people, or they’re not savvy people. Iran was a tremendous threat.”
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt accused Kent of spreading “false claims” in his resignation letter, emphasizing that Trump had sent “his top negotiators” to prevent war and had “strong and compelling evidence that Iran was going to attack the United States first.”
She dismissed “the absurd allegation that President Trump made this decision based on the influence of others, even foreign countries,” labeling it as “both insulting and laughable.”
