A newly surfaced whistleblower disclosure to the House Judiciary Committee reveals that the FBI allegedly conducted a covert investigation of Donald Trump immediately following his presidential campaign announcement in June 2015. This previously unknown operation, reportedly ordered by then-FBI Director James Comey, preceded the well-known Crossfire Hurricane investigation.

Key revelations from the whistleblower report include:

• The operation was allegedly kept “off-the-books” and deliberately hidden from Justice Department Inspector General Michael E. Horowitz during his investigation of FBI misconduct.
• Two female FBI undercover agents were reportedly deployed as “honeypots” to infiltrate Trump’s 2016 campaign at senior levels.
• The investigation was reportedly terminated after a newspaper obtained a photograph of one of the undercover agents, which the FBI allegedly mishandled by falsely claiming the person was an informant whose life would be at risk if identified.

According to former FBI Assistant Director Chris Swecker, if the allegations prove true, they represent a “booming, egregious violation” of FBI protocols, particularly given the lack of predication for investigating a presidential campaign. The House Judiciary Committee has confirmed receipt of the whistleblower allegations and plans to investigate them further.

The disclosure raises fresh questions about potential institutional bias within the FBI during the 2016 presidential campaign, coming years after investigations failed to find evidence of Trump-Russia collusion in the separate Crossfire Hurricane probe.

Read more: Whistleblower: James Comey had FBI ‘honey pot’ spies infiltrate Trump’s 2016 campaign

This article is written with the assistance of generative artificial intelligence based solely on Washington Times original reporting and wire services. For more information, please read our AI policy here or contact Ann Wog, Managing Editor for Digital, at awog@washingtontimes.com.

The Washington Times AI Ethics Newsroom Committee can be reached at aispotlight@washingtontimes.com.

• The Washington Times Newsroom can be reached at aispotlight@washingtontimes.com.