WASHINGTON \u2014 At least two FBI agents involved in past investigations into President Donald Trump were told Monday that they had been fired, only to learn later in the day that those terminations had been reversed or put on hold, according to six people familiar with the decisions.<\/p>\n
Then on Tuesday morning, the two agents learned they had indeed been fired, along with two other employees, according to three of the people familiar with the decisions.<\/p>\n
The chaotic process highlights the turmoil and uncertainty across federal law enforcement amid overhauls at the Justice Department and FBI that have targeted those who helped secure indictments against Trump<\/a> or are viewed by the president as aligned with his political enemies<\/a>.<\/p>\n The targeted FBI agents were tied to either special counsel Jack Smith\u2019s probe or the initial investigation into Trump that began in 2022 and that the FBI dubbed \u201cArctic Frost.\u201d <\/p>\n An FBI spokesperson declined to comment, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia did not respond to a request comment.<\/p>\n The FBI Agents Association, which represents FBI employees, criticized the actions against the four FBI employees, casting them as part of “a campaign of erratic and arbitrary retribution” led by FBI Director Kash Patel.<\/p>\n \u201cThe actions yesterday \u2014 in which FBI Special Agents were terminated and then reinstated shortly after, and then only to be fired again today \u2014 highlight the chaos that occurs when long-standing policies and processes are ignored,” the association said in a statement. “An Agent simply being assigned to an investigation and conducting it appropriately within the law should never be grounds for termination.”<\/p>\n The turmoil on Monday and Tuesday followed separate terminations or departures at the FBI and Justice Department last week. Two prosecutors who mentioned the events of Jan. 6, 2021, in a sentencing memo were placed on administrative leave<\/a>.<\/p>\n On Thursday, Patel also dismissed Steven Palmer, a 27-year veteran of the FBI who in part oversaw the agency\u2019s use of government planes and led its critical incident response group, according to one of the six people familiar with the decisions.<\/p>\n Bloomberg first reported <\/a>Palmer\u2019s firing. NBC News has not confirmed the reason for Palmer\u2019s firing.<\/p>\n Palmer did not respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n Recently, the FBI has fired employees linked to investigators\u2019 decision to obtain phone call records<\/a> of nine Republican U.S. senators as they examined Trump\u2019s attempt to overturn his 2020 election loss.<\/p>\n Aaron Tapp, the special agent in charge of the San Antonio field office, was pushed out after his name appeared in internal documents recently released by Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, in connection with the FBI\u2019s analysis of the phone data, according to one of the six people familiar with the decisions.<\/p>\n Tapp declined to comment.<\/p>\n The overhaul began within days of Trump taking office in January, when the Justice Department fired several career lawyers<\/a> involved in Smith\u2019s probe.<\/p>\n