Judicial Watch Sues Justice Department for FBI Records Found in Secret Room

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today that it filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Justice for “hidden” records from former FBI Director James Comey’s era that were referenced during a Fox News interview with Deputy Director Dan Bongino (Judicial Watch v U.S. Department of Justice (No.1:25-cv-04047)).

The suit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia after the FBI failed to respond to a June 2, 2025, FOIA request for:

1. All documents referenced by Deputy Director Dan Bongino as having been discovered in a room “hidden from us and not mentioned to us,” discussed in a Fox News interview at https://x.com/libsoftiktok/status/1928099455095427383;

2. All internal FBI communications among officials in the offices of FBI Director Kash Patel and FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino related to the discovery of these documents; and

3. All directives sent to officials from the offices of the Director and/or Deputy Director regarding the handling and disposition of the documents.

The May 29, 2025, X post about the Fox News interview with Bongino has the headline “The FBI just discovered that James Comey had a whole room of secret documents! We found it in bags, hiding under Jim Comey’s FBI, you’re going to be stunned. – FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino.” Bongino states:

There was a room [in FBI Headquarters], and we found stuff. A lot of stuff … hidden from us at least and not mentioned to us. And then found stuff in there. A lot is from the Comey era. We are working … right now to declassify. And just so you know, because I get the public—I totally understand people saying “well do it now.” The process is: not all of the information is ours to declassify. Some is other intelligence agencies’…. We literally can’t do it. Once that gets done … and you read some of the stuff we found—that, by the way, was not processed through the normal procedure, digitizing and putting in FBI records. We found it in bags, hiding under Jim Comey’s FBI. You’re going to be stunned.

Comey was indicted in September on charges of making false statements and obstruction of justice regarding the Trump-Russia investigation.

“We know Comey was spying on Donald Trump. He was the Obama administration’s go-to guy, trying to set Trump up to be toppled from the campaign and then from office,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “These hidden-room documents may contain additional smoking guns.”

In August 2025, Judicial Watch sued the Justice Department for all records regarding the FBI, under then-Director James Comey, initiating an investigation of then-2016 presidential candidate Donald Trump.

In May 2023, Judicial Watch recapped its investigative findings regarding the “Steele Dossier” and the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane investigation, which was launched during the Obama administration in July 2016 under Comey.

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