OAN Staff Katherine Mosack and Brooke Mallory
2:23 PM – Thursday, March 19, 2026
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has reportedly been investigating former National Counterterrorism Center Director Joe Kent — who recently resigned “in protest” of the United States’ ongoing conflict with Iran — citing alleged leaks of classified information, according to multiple sources familiar with the case.
The FBI investigation into Kent predates his resignation. According to sources cited by Semafor and CBS News, the probe has been active for months, and it did not start as a sudden reaction to his resignation letter.
Administration officials told Axios that Kent had been labeled a “known leaker” well before his departure. This reputation was reportedly why he had already been barred from certain high-level presidential briefings and excluded from key discussions regarding Iran.
Earlier in the week, on Tuesday, Kent resigned as the director of the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC), claiming that he stepped down in protest of the ongoing U.S.-Israeli military campaign against Iran. Kent further emphasized in his resignation letter that he “cannot in good conscience” support the conflict, suggesting that this was the reason for his departure. He also boldly claimed that Iran poses “no imminent threat” while alleging that the U.S. was pressured by Israel into joining the military effort.
“After much reflection, I have decided to resign from my position as Director of the National Counterterrorism Center, effective today,” Kent wrote on X. “I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran”
Trump administration officials have quickly dismissed Kent’s claim that the “imminent threat” from Iran was a manufactured fiction, maintaining that his allegations carry no weight since he was long excluded from high-level Iran intelligence briefings.
Nonetheless, Kent has countered that as the NCTC director, his agency should have been the primary body tracking the tactical details of any potential strike; and because his “analysts” found no such evidence, he concluded the conflict’s justification was merely a “misinformation campaign” fueled by Israeli influence and outside lobbyists. Kent also argues that his exclusion from these briefings was a calculated move to “freeze out” any possible dissenting voices.
However, the White House responded back by explaining that Kent was purposely kept in the dark solely due to an ongoing FBI investigation into his alleged government leaks, asserting that the intelligence was so sensitive it remained on a “need-to-know” basis that Kent — deemed untrustworthy and “weak on security” — no longer met.
Another source confirmed to NewsNation on Wednesday that the investigation into Kent was already well underway by the time he left his post. Officials reiterated that he had been “a known leaker” and was thus left out of briefings with the president.
“He left quite an online paper trail, and he has been monitored for months,” a source familiar with the investigation told Axios. “He’s going to try to say this was in retaliation for his resignation, but it’s the other way around: He quit because he’s under investigation and he knew it.”
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt also recently stated in a press briefing that Kent’s resignation letter had contained a slew of “false claims,” emphasizing that Kent’s theory that Trump was convinced by a foreign country to incite the conflict was both false, “insulting” and “laughable.”
Kent “was not involved in any of the discussions” before or during Operation Epic Fury, and had not had a role in drawing up the president’s intelligence briefings in “a while,” she told Fox News during an interview on Wednesday.
Later on Wednesday, Kent also appeared in a two-hour interview with podcaster Tucker Carlson, a fellow critic of the administration’s support for Israel who has since utilized his platform to attract the anti-Israel conservative base. During the sit-down, Kent pushed back against Leavitt’s assertions.
“I’m sure the administration will come out and say, ‘No, you just weren’t invited,’ but I’ve got a pretty good idea of how those meetings look, and even if I wasn’t invited, I at least would’ve known that they took place,” he confidently told Carlson.
However, as of now, Kent has not provided any direct physical evidence to substantiate his claims. Rather, his “evidence” consists of his own personal theories and a series of circumstantial “data points” that he shared during his recent interview with Carlson. In the discussion, Kent also claimed that Iran’s late Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed in the initial strikes, had actually been “moderating” the nuclear program in order to avoid a full-scale war, Military.com reported.
“Joe Kent was right. Therefore, Joe Kent must be destroyed,” Carlson said rhetorically, attempting to position Kent as a sort of martyr. “And there is, of course, this ongoing effort to do that, to dismiss Joe Kent as a tool of the Islamists, or a leaker.”
Responding to the resignation, President Trump remarked that Kent’s departure actually turned out to be a positive development, noting, “When I read his statement, I realized it’s a good thing that he’s out, because he said Iran is not a threat.”
“Every country realized what a threat Iran was,” Trump added, referencing the numerous nations who have since come out in support of the United States and Israel’s military campaign to topple the Islamic regime.
While the United Kingdom (UK) and Spain initially withheld consent for the use of their bases, the UK reversed its stance following Iranian strikes on a British air base in Cyprus, granting the U.S. permission to use RAF Fairford and Diego Garcia to “destroy missiles at the source.”
Muslims make up approximately 6.7% of the total population of England, and London has the highest concentration, with approximately 15% of the city’s residents identifying as Muslim. According to some analysts, this demographic makeup likely made UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer initially cautious about supporting Operation Epic Fury.
Meanwhile, regionally, Jordan has also emerged as a vital operational hub amid the conflict, hosting U.S. F-16CJ fighter jets redeployed from Italy to conduct suppression of enemy air defense missions. Additionally, Gulf nations like the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain have focused on providing defensive participation, utilizing U.S.-integrated air defense systems to maintain high interception rates against Iranian drone and missile salvos.
Furthermore, logistical and intelligence support remains bolstered by the Five Eyes alliance and key European hubs like Ramstein Air Base in Germany.
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