Judicial Watch Sues for Emails of FBI Executive Abusing Whistleblowers

Judicial Watch is the national leader in fighting for accountability and truth against powerful federal agencies.

We filed a FOIA lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) for emails of Dena Perkins, a section chief of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), regarding whistleblower retaliation (Judicial Watch Inc. v. U.S. Department of Justice (No. 1:25-cv-00891)).

Perkins was identified by Sen. Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, as an official who retaliated against whistleblowers who were considered pro-Donald Trump:

So, now I’m going to spend some time sharing statements from the whistleblowers who were retaliated against by some of the FBI officials Trump has recently fired.

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A third FBI whistleblower said, “On January 6, 2021, I took leave and went to see the President speak on the Ellipse. Later, my wife and I were among a crowd southwest of the Capitol. Even though we were involved in no violence, never set foot on the steps leading to the Capitol building, and never entered it, I self-reported my presence to the FBI after seeing the violence in news reports. The FBI did nothing at first, but more than a year later suspended my security clearance. Under the supervision of Jeff Veltri and Dena Perkins, investigators questioned my co-workers about whether I ever vocalized support for President Trump or objections to the COVID-19 vaccine. I was forced to take early retirement to pay bills and have essentially been sidelined from employment opportunities due to FBI abuse of the clearance system to target me for my political beliefs.”

A fourth FBI whistleblower and a registered Democrat said, “As a Security Division employee, I witnessed abuses committed against multiple employees by FBI senior leaders, particularly by Jeff Veltri and Dena Perkins. I also saw Security Division retaliate against five of its own employees for protesting these unlawful practices. Because I spoke out against these abuses, Perkins and Timothy Dunham suspended my security clearance, costing me my job and continuing employment, totaling approximately $700,000 in lost wages and retirement benefits.”

A fifth FBI whistleblower said, “Although some FBI leaders who abused the clearance process like Dena Perkins and Jeff Veltri have already left, they weren’t alone. Timothy Dunham approved Perkins’s wrongdoing and engaged in his own. While most Security Division employees are fantastic, some FBI leaders still remain within the Security Integrity and Investigations Section who’ll continue this abuse of the process.”

From FBI whistleblower Marcus Allen, “Jeff Veltri and Dena Perkins caused the suspension of my security clearance because I questioned whether the FBI Director was truthful to Congress and whether the FBI was obeying the law and Constitution in the January 6, 2021 investigations. Their actions left me without pay for over two years while other FBI officials prevented me from having other income. Although the FBI ultimately reinstated my clearance and settled my lawsuit, my career at the FBI was over and the financial and emotional damage to me and my family will never be completely restored.”

Another FBI whistleblower said, “After I was assigned to review Marcus Allen’s security clearance case, I noticed the file was missing relevant communications of Jeff Veltri, who ordered the opening of the case, Dena Perkins and FBI attorney Tasha Gibbs. Allen was entitled to those communications, which were evidence that his clearance suspension was retaliatory. Shortly after I completed the vast majority of work on the communication recommending Allen’s reinstatement, the Allen case was reassigned to another adjudicator and I was transferred to a different unit, apparently in reprisal for reporting the wrongdoing in the Allen suspension. I soon resigned from the FBI to avoid further retaliation. I believe Veltri, Perkins and Gibbs were responsible for retaliating against Allen, and that Giulio Arseni, Perkins and Gibbs were likely responsible for the retaliation against me.” [Marcus isrepresented by Judicial Watch.]

From FBI whistleblower Garret O’Boyle: “I faced retaliation from junior, mid and senior level ‘leaders’ in the FBI. More than 29 months later, I’m still indefinitely suspended without pay and benefits. Other whistleblowers have since confirmed that the FBI intentionally stranded me in the middle of a move and withheld our possessions to maximize the pain of my suspension. A new era of accountability and true whistleblower protection at the FBI is long overdue. FBI officials like Sean Clark, Sean Fitzgerald, Jeff Berkebile, Dena Perkins, Jeff Veltri, Jennifer Moore, Michael Schneider, Timothy Dunham and other leadership up to Christopher Wray are responsible for what happened to me and my family. Ensuring that they no longer work at the FBI isn’t retribution, its responsible leadership.”

We sued after the Justice Department failed to respond to a May 10, 2024, FOIA request for:

1. All emails sent to and from Section Chief Dena Perkins regarding “whistleblower”, “whistleblowers”, “O’Boyle”, “Veritas” and/or “Trump”.

2. All SF-50s and SF-52s for SC Perkins.

SF-50s and SF-52s are documents recording personnel actions such as promotions.

Perkins was among several FBI officials reportedly fired by the Trump administration.

Our lawsuit shows elements of the FBI are still in cover-up mode about its mistreatment of agents who indicated support of Donald Trump or opposition to FBI abuses. Transparency and accountability can’t come soon enough.

We are perhaps the nation’s leading FOIA litigant against the FBI on its corruption issues, as well as lawfare against President Trump.

In March 2025, we filed suit against the Justice Department for details of any investigations, inquiries, or referrals concerning potential misconduct of any person working for Special Counsel Jack Smith.

In September 2024, we sued the Justice Department for messages among top leaders of the FBI referencing social media posts of Special Agent Jeffrey Veltri, head of the Miami Field Office, which is investigating the September 15 assassination attempt against Donald Trump.

In May 2024, we uncovered a recording of a phone message left by an FBI special agent for someone at the Secret Service in the context of the raid on President Trump’s home in Mar-a-Lago, Florida.

In April 2024, Justice Department records showed that the FBI opened a criminal investigation of Air Force veteran Ashli Babbitt after her killing and listed four “potential violations of federal law,” including felony rioting and civil disorder.

In January 2023, we sued the Justice Department for records of communications between the FBI and social media sites regarding foreign influence in elections, as well as the Hunter Biden laptop story.

In November 2023, we, along with CatholicVote Civic Action, received FBI records showing top officials rushing to craft a public response to the leaked FBI intelligence memo that revealed its targeting of Catholics who adhere to traditional beliefs on church issues. In December 2023, heavily redacted records from the FBI showed that the agency’s Office of General Counsel reviewed the controversial targeting of Catholics by the Richmond field office of the FBI.

Judicial Watch Sues Justice Department for Epstein Client Lists

The Justice Department and FBI need to respond to public demands for transparency under law and release the Jeffrey Epstein files.

We filed a FOIA lawsuit against the Department of Justice for records regarding Epstein, including any records on the identities of clients or associates of Epstein (Judicial Watch Inc. v. U.S. Department of Justice (No. 1:25-cv-01056)).

We sued after the Justice Department failed to adequately respond to four separate FOIA requests for records concerning Jeffrey Epstein, including a specific request for records “depicting the identities of clients or associates of Jeffrey Epstein.” Epstein document requests were sent to the Justice Department’s Office of Information Policy and the Criminal Division, and two separate requests were sent to the FBI.

The lawsuit references a February 24, 2025, Fox News report stating that President Trump’s “return to the Oval Office came with the prospect of the public finally being able to see Epstein’s long-awaited ‘black book’ amid inquiries into the deceased financier and sex trafficker.”

Epstein died in federal custody in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges.

On February 27, 2025, the Justice Department released a long-awaited trove of documents related to Epstein. As stated by the New York Post: “But the much-hyped, roughly 200-page document dump provided no big revelations, instead listing celebrities and politicians who were already known to have palled around with the notorious pedophile.”

Border Crossings Lowest in History, from 155,000 a Month to 7,180

President Trump’s border security surge is working. After years of wave after wave of foreign nationals walking freely into our country, we are finally getting relief. Our Corruption Chronicles blog reports.

After years of getting hammered by the Biden administration’s catastrophic—and inconceivable—open border policies, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is delivering much-needed good news; in March the United States experienced the lowest southwest border crossings in history thanks to new measures put in place by President Trump to finally secure the famously porous Mexican border region. The new government figures show a remarkably quick turnaround for an administration that inherited an extraordinary crisis in which a ghastly 7.6 illegal aliens entered the country, nearly 2 million of them from nation’s that Biden’s own DHS determined pose a national security threat to the U.S.

In a matter of weeks, the Trump administration took control of the situation, with a dramatic drop in illegal crossings, around 7,180 a month compared to the monthly average of 155,000 from the previous four years. Daily southwest border apprehensions have also decreased an incredible 95%, to about 230 daily from an astonishing 5,100 per day under Biden. This marks a pivotal achievement in the nation’s border security efforts, according to an announcement issued recently by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP). “This milestone demonstrates that operational control is becoming a reality — which seemed impossible just a few months ago under the Biden administration — as enforcement measures continue to yield significant results,” the DHS agency writes. Border Patrol agents have finally been empowered to shut down unlawful entry and protect American lives, CBP Commissioner Pete Flores confirms. He says the message is clear: “The border is closed to illegal crossings, and for those still willing to test our resolve, know this — you will be prosecuted, and you will be deported.”

It is a vastly different message than the one sent by the Biden administration, which proudly rolled out the welcome mat for a record number of illegal immigrants, including droves of violent gang members, Islamic terrorists, tens of thousands of Chinese nationals and a myriad of criminals. The former president’s own DHS determined that over 1.7 million illegal aliens from countries that pose a national security threat entered the U.S. during his tenure and dozens that appear on the terrorist watchlist were released into American communities, according to government figures reluctantly provided to Congress. The migrants from countries that pose a security threat to the U.S. are labeled Special Interest Aliens (SIA) by the government and they come from some 26 nations, including Afghanistan, Cuba, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Nigeria, Syria, and Turkey, China, North Korea, Kyrgyzstan, Mauritania, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Venezuela.

The previous administration also released over half a million criminal aliens inside the U.S. by putting them on a “non-detained docket” that allowed them to live in communities throughout the nation. Over 435,000 had criminal convictions and another 226,847 pending charges, according to DHS figures made public by a congressional committee. Nearly 15,000 of the freed illegal aliens were convicted of or charged with murder, more than 20,000 with sexual assault, 60,268 with burglary, larceny, or robbery, 105,146 with assault, 16,820 with weapon offenses, 3,971 with commercialized sex crimes and 3,372 with kidnapping. Over 126,000 committed traffic offenses, more than 70,000 are in the system for drug crimes, 21,106 for fraudulent activities and 12,000 for obstruction of justice. As a parting gift in early January the Biden administration shielded nearly a million foreign nationals from deportation with Temporary Protected Status (TPS), a humanitarian measure designed to help undocumented aliens avoid removal during emergencies.

Fortunately, the Trump administration revoked Biden’s eleventh-hour TPS, though a series of lawsuits were quickly filed by leftist groups in the name of the illegal aliens, who are mostly from Venezuela, Cuba, Haiti, and Nicaragua. The new administration’s message is clear and has been spread in Spanish-language media throughout Latin America. It warns illegal aliens not to come to America and break its laws. “If you are a criminal alien considering entering America illegally: Don’t even think about it,” said DHS Secretary Kristi Noem. “If you come here and break our laws, we will hunt you down.” Criminals are not welcome in the United States.”

Until next week,