John Bolton was indicted Thursday on 18 counts of mishandling classified information—and the circumstances reveal a striking convergence. Iranian hackers allegedly breached Bolton’s email accounts and delivered evidence to federal investigators. Trump has publicly demanded Bolton’s prosecution for years. Two supposed adversaries—Iran and Trump—align on a mutual enemy.
Think about that alignment. The Islamic Republic of Iran, which Trump claims to oppose, provided the ammunition. The Trump Justice Department pulled the trigger. Bolton spent decades advocating U.S. military strikes on Iran, dating back to Iran-Contra in the 1980s. Now Iran may have supplied the evidence that puts him in prison, and Trump’s DOJ is prosecuting the case.
The irony multiplies: Bolton spent years attacking Hillary Clinton over her private server, claiming if he’d done the same, he’d be “in a jumpsuit.” He allegedly sent top secret materials through a personal AOL account, shared intelligence with family members, stored documents at home. Now he faces exactly the prospect he promised Clinton deserved.
The Legitimacy Problem
If the allegations prove true, Bolton violated federal law. That’s not complicated. What’s complicated is everything around it.
Bolton becomes the third Trump critic indicted in three weeks, following James Comey and Letitia James. Trump has publicly demanded Bolton’s prosecution for years. The pattern is unmistakable: the president’s declared enemies face federal charges.
But Justice Department sources insist this case is different. Career prosecutors in Maryland’s U.S. Attorney’s Office led the investigation, not political appointees in Washington. The case was “compartmentalized” and “insulated” from main Justice decision-makers. The investigation began during Trump’s first term when Bolton was writing his book, temporarily calmed down, then resumed under Biden—long before Pamela Bondi became Attorney General. One federal prosecutor told the BBC this is “a legitimate classified information prosecution, not one driven by retribution.”
Bolton has hired Abbe Lowell, a sharp attorney who argues the documents were “unclassified personal diaries” long known to the FBI. The case will likely go to trial.
Here’s the problem: when a president publicly targets critics and they subsequently get prosecuted—especially when foreign adversaries provide the evidence—the legitimacy of even genuine cases becomes impossible to establish. Trump’s pressure corrupts the process whether individual prosecutors act with integrity or not. And when Iran and Trump want the same outcome, questions about whose interests are being served become unavoidable.
The Prosecutor Who Refused—and Was Purged
The same day Bolton was indicted, U.S. Attorney Todd Gilbert resigned after refusing orders to pursue what he called “baseless criminal charges” against Trump’s Russia investigators. Gilbert was pressured to open grand jury proceedings targeting the FBI and intelligence officials who examined Trump’s 2016 campaign—and was forced out when he declined.
So within 24 hours, we have DOJ claiming Bolton’s prosecution is apolitical while simultaneously learning that prosecutors who refuse to bring political cases get purged. Those realities can’t coexist. Either the Justice Department operates on evidence and law, or it operates on loyalty and targeting. Gilbert’s resignation proves which system we’re under.
The question isn’t whether Bolton violated the law. The question is whether an American Justice Department can credibly prosecute cases when the president’s demands align with foreign intelligence operations against his critics. When Iran hacks evidence and Trump prosecutes, who’s serving whose agenda?
The Surveillance State Goes Live
The surveillance and enforcement infrastructure being activated makes mass targeting operationally possible. Senator Ron Wyden revealed that ICE, Secret Service, and Navy criminal divisions all accessed Flock’s AI-powered network of tens of thousands of cameras tracking vehicles nationwide. Homeland Security Investigations used the system nearly 200 times during the deportation campaign. Federal agencies now have warrantless access to a private surveillance network monitoring movement across the entire country.
Weaponizing the IRS Against Donors
Meanwhile, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent plans to overhaul the IRS criminal division, sidelining agency lawyers and installing loyalists to pursue liberal donors and nonprofits under “terrorism financing” investigations. George Soros and his affiliates top the target list. This follows the exact Russian playbook from 2002, when counterterrorism laws were weaponized to silence opposition organizations and independent media.
The Military Purge Begins
The military isn’t immune. Admiral Alvin Holsey, head of U.S. Southern Command, is being forced into early retirement after questioning the legality of military strikes near Venezuela that have killed nearly 30 people since September. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth lost confidence in Holsey for asking whether the operations were legal—the basic question every military officer is obligated to ask before following orders.
The Nazi Problem No One Will Name
And then there’s the Nazi problem no one wants to name directly. A U.S. flag with a swastika was found in Republican Representative Dave Taylor’s congressional office, photographed during a virtual meeting. This follows revelations of Nazi admiration and racist slurs in Young Republicans’ private chats, Border Patrol posting Michael Jackson’s original lyrics containing “Jew me, sue me, kike me,” and Department of Homeland Security promoting “Remigrate”—a term rooted in neo-Nazi ideology used by European fascist parties.
When Legitimacy Becomes Impossible
Whether Bolton’s case has merit becomes almost academic when the entire apparatus is being transformed to serve authoritarian ends. Prosecutors who resist political cases get purged. Surveillance networks track citizens without warrants. The IRS is being restructured to prosecute donations as terrorism. Military officers are removed for questioning legality. Nazi symbols appear in congressional offices.
And when supposed adversaries like Iran and Trump coordinate to take down mutual enemies, the line between American justice and foreign intelligence operations disappears entirely.
The system doesn’t need every prosecution to be illegitimate—it just needs enough legitimate cases mixed with political targeting that no one can tell the difference anymore. That’s how rule of law dies: not with a bang, but with the steady erosion of the line between justice and revenge. And it dies even faster when foreign adversaries and American presidents discover they want the same people destroyed.
The Trump Tyranny Tracker airs live Tuesdays and Thursdays at 7PM ET. Follow Olga Lautman’s essential tracking at Trump Tyranny Tracker on Substack.
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