Two former FBI special agents are taking their old employer to court, claiming they were dumped from the bureau because they worked on the Arctic Frost investigation into efforts to overturn the 2020 election. Their new federal lawsuit asks a judge to toss out the firings and put them back on the job.
According to AP, the case was filed in federal court in Washington and identifies the two plaintiffs only as John Doe 1 and John Doe 2. The lawsuit says they were terminated "solely" because of their work on Arctic Frost. AP notes the filing is the latest in a series of challenges to personnel shakeups at the bureau under Director Kash Patel.
The complaint, posted on the court docket and available via CourtListener, paints a picture of two agents who say they were model employees right up until they were shown the door. One had served more than 20 years and received a Medal of Excellence. The other graduated from the FBI Academy in 2018. Both, the filing says, consistently earned "exemplary" performance ratings and had spotless disciplinary records before they were abruptly dismissed between Oct. 31 and Nov. 4, 2025, with little or no explanation.
Why the Plaintiffs Say They Were Targeted
The timing, the lawsuit argues, was no coincidence. The complaint links the firings to the public release of previously withheld Arctic Frost documents by Sen. Chuck Grassley, which revealed an agent’s name and ramped up criticism of the investigation. Coverage earlier in the fall had already detailed Patel’s broader personnel moves tied to the Arctic Frost fallout, and The New York Times reported that Patel had previously dismissed other agents whose names surfaced in records associated with the special counsel inquiry.
What the Lawyers Say
The agents’ attorneys, quoted in both the lawsuit and media reports, accuse bureau leadership of breaking its word. Margaret Donovan is quoted as saying Patel "went back on a promise not to fire agents based on the cases they were assigned," while Elizabeth Tulis argues the plaintiffs "accepted an assignment from their supervisors and carried it out professionally and apolitically." Those statements were reported by AP.
Legal Road Ahead
The complaint, filed as Civil Action No. 1:26-cv-00959, asks the court for reinstatement, a declaratory judgment that the firings were unlawful, and other equitable relief. The plaintiffs say their dismissals violated their First Amendment associational rights and Fifth Amendment due process protections. The lawsuit names Director Kashyap P. Patel and Attorney General Pamela J. Bondi as defendants and lays out the theory that the agents were punished for their assignment to Arctic Frost, not for any alleged misconduct. The full claim is available via CourtListener.
What to Watch Next
Previous reporting has shown that lawsuits and public fights over FBI personnel decisions have become a recurring subplot in the Arctic Frost saga, with news outlets chronicling earlier firings and challenges that followed Grassley’s document releases. For now, the bureau has not publicly answered these latest allegations, and the next moves will play out on the federal court docket in Washington, where a judge will decide whether the case gets an early hearing. The New York Times has tracked related personnel changes in the past.
As this lawsuit works its way through the U.S. District Court in Washington, it adds yet another legal test to an already fraught debate over how oversight, politics, and everyday personnel calls collide inside the country’s premier law enforcement agency.
