Dan Bongino says he is stepping down as FBI deputy director after just 10 months on the job.
The FBI’s No. 2 announced his exit from the bureau in an X post on Wednesday afternoon, following reports that he had begun clearing out his office.
“I will be leaving my position with the FBI in January. I want to thank President Trump, AG Bondi, and Director Patel for the opportunity to serve with purpose,” wrote Bongino, 51. “Most importantly, I want to thank you, my fellow Americans, for the privilege to serve you. God bless America, and all those who defend Her.”
His exit comes just two days before the Department of Justice’s deadline to release all Jeffrey Epstein files.
Asked by reporters why Bongino was planning to leave the federal law enforcement agency, President Donald Trump told reporters, “Dan did a great job. I think he wants to go back to his show.”
Bongino, a former New York City police officer and Secret Service agent, was a far-right podcast host for years before Trump installed him as FBI deputy director on March 17.
The New York native was the first deputy director in modern history with no experience as an FBI agent, according to MS Now. The position does not require Senate confirmation.
MS Now reported earlier Wednesday that Bongino, who served under FBI Director Kash Patel, told confidants he will not return to headquarters to work this month, citing eight people briefed on his account.
Bongino, who announced his resignation exactly nine months after he took office, has already begun sending office “knick-knacks” and other personal items back to Florida, where he intends to return to pro-Trump broadcasting ahead of the 2026 midterms, The New York Times reported.
It was reported last week by former Politico journalist Rachael Bade that Bongino was to be Trump’s “fall-guy” over Epstein, although the FBI denied this to be the case to the Daily Beast in the strongest terms.
An FBI source told the Daily Beast on Wednesday: “While we all serve at the pleasure of the president, of course, it’s not in any way true Bongino is being axed over the Epstein files or anything else. If and when he does leave, it would be on his own.”
Bongino—a longtime Trump loyalist whom the president named to the post in February—has publicly acknowledged the tension between his prior media role and his FBI position.
The former Secret Service special agent built a MAGA following by stoking suspicions of a cover-up and demanding the government release everything on Trump’s former friend, the late pedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein.
The president denies any wrongdoing related to Epstein, who died in prison in 2019 while awaiting trial on child sex trafficking charges, but his links continue to haunt him.
After Bongino took office as FBI deputy director in March, he angered MAGA by pivoting to a more cautious line—framing delays as necessary to protect victims—just as the administration’s transparency promises unraveled.
In July, after a DOJ-FBI memo said there was no “client list” and reaffirmed Epstein’s suicide, Bongino reportedly skipped work and issued an ultimatum in a clash with Attorney General Pam Bondi: “She goes, or I go.”
FBI sources told the Beast earlier this month that Bongino had always been due to be on paid leave, although when he returned, his public posture appeared to become defensive.
Bloomberg’s FOIA Files then supplied the documents behind the drama. Emails obtained by the outlet showed the FBI’s “Special Redaction Project,” including crash-course training for about 1,000 agents at the Central Records Complex in Winchester, Virginia, and $851,344 in overtime between March 17 and March 22.
A March 18 email chain forwarded to Bongino with redaction “guidance” prompted him to insist on X earlier this month that he had requested the earlier correspondence to see what had been done before he started.
In appearance on Fox News days later, he told host Sean Hannity: “I was paid in the past, Sean, for my opinions, that’s clear, and one day I will be back in that space—but that’s not what I’m paid for now,” adding: “I’m paid to be your deputy director, and we base investigations on facts.”
Bongino has also upset colleagues. Earlier this month, a group of anonymous agents leaked a dossier listing the failings of Bongino and Patel, while calling on them to go.
His possible exit comes as Patel, 45, also faces intensifying scrutiny over his cross-country jaunts on a government jet and his ongoing habit of broadcasting investigative updates online.
Just this week, during the manhunt after a Brown University classroom shooting that killed two people and injured nine, he posted about a “person of interest” who was later released.
Representative Seth Magaziner, a Rhode Island Democrat, said Patel should “take a lesson” from local officials and “not jump the gun,” according to The Providence Journal.
It is just the latest in a long line of embarrassing flubs that have seen Patel earn the nickname “Keystone Kash.”
