Politics

BREAKING: Chuck Grassley, Ron Johnson Expose Deep State Witch Hunt — New Records Confirm Corrupt FBI Seized Trump, Pence Government Cell Phones and Conducted Sweeping Interviews to Push Bogus ‘Arctic Frost’ Probe

Photos by Brandon Bell/Getty Images and Jerry Lampen/AFP via Getty Images

Senators Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Ron Johnson (R-WI) have blown the lid off yet another sham investigation orchestrated by Biden’s corrupt Department of Justice (DOJ) and the politically compromised FBI.

According to newly uncovered documents, the agencies weaponized their power to target President Donald Trump, former Vice President Mike Pence, and their allies through an illegitimate probe dubbed “Arctic Frost.”

Armed with whistleblower disclosures and damning internal documents, the senators are sounding the alarm over “Operation Arctic Frost,” a taxpayer-funded witch hunt that seized government-issued cell phones belonging to former President Donald Trump and former Vice President Mike Pence while conducting a sweeping barrage of interviews across the country.

The FBI did not require a warrant to take possession of government phones from the Biden White House. However, after securing the devices, agents began preparing a search warrant to access their data, sources familiar with the investigation told Fox News.

“The Biden White House played right along with the FBI’s ‘gotcha’ scheme against Trump,” the source told Fox News.

“Biden’s Office of White House Counsel, under the leadership of Dana Remus and Jonathan Su, gave its blessing and accommodation for the FBI to physically obtain Trump and Pence’s phones in early May 2022. Weeks later, the FBI began drafting a search warrant to extract the phones’ data.”

In a fiery letter dated March 13, 2025, addressed to Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel, Grassley and Johnson pulled no punches.

They allege that Arctic Frost, launched in April 2022 under the Biden administration, was a blatant abuse of power spearheaded by anti-Trump FBI Assistant Special Agent in Charge (ASAC) Timothy Thibault.

The senators claim Thibault violated FBI protocols—specifically the “No Self-Approval Rule”—to kickstart the investigation, which later morphed into Special Counsel Jack Smith’s baseless elector case against Trump, relying on fabricated justifications, including the absurd claim that Trump and his associates had engaged in “fraudulent” activities related to the 2020 election.

The whistleblower documents detail how the FBI aggressively pursued over 50 subpoenas, secretly gathered records from more than 100 different facilities and email accounts, and conducted a second wave of interviews across multiple states in their desperate attempt to manufacture a case against Trump and his allies.

But perhaps the most damning revelation is that the DOJ and FBI took possession of government-issued cell phones that previously belonged to Trump and Pence—devices that were apparently retrieved from White House personnel.

These phones, which could contain sensitive presidential communications, were seized before any search warrants were even obtained.

In other words, the FBI was fishing for dirt first and worried about legality later.

Jack Smith’s Phony Prosecution Traced Back to Biden’s FBI

The Arctic Frost probe, which started in April 2022, was fast-tracked by anti-Trump operatives and prioritized “over all other cases,” according to leaked internal emails.

Source: Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley
Source: Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley
Source: Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley

Each week, investigative updates were sent up the chain, landing on the desks of top brass like Washington Field Office (WFO) Assistant Director in Charge Steven D’Antuono and Special Assistant Jill Adams. The goal? To lay the groundwork for an indictment against Trump that would later be handed over to Jack Smith’s team of partisan prosecutors.

By May 2022, the FBI had already mapped out its endgame: building a “narrative” that painted Republican electors and Trump campaign officials as part of a “scheme.”

The FBI even attempted to merge Arctic Frost with a separate DOJ-OIG investigation into former Acting Assistant Attorney General Jeffrey Clark, further proving their intent to drag as many Trump allies as possible into their web of lawfare.

Read the press release below:

In a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Kash Patel, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations Chairman Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) made public legally protected whistleblower disclosures showing the FBI, as part of its Arctic Frost investigation, acquired the government cell phones of President Donald Trump and former Vice President Mike Pence, among other government officials.

FBI agents used taxpayer dollars to crisscross the country and conduct dozens of interviews in support of the political probe.

The unclassified FBI records convey the alarming scope and speed of the FBI’s 2022 investigation of President Trump, which they dubbed “Operation Arctic Frost.”

The investigation – launched by anti-Trump FBI agent Timothy Thibault in a breach of FBI protocol – formed the basis of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s elector case against Trump. Upon opening the investigation, Thibault vowed it would be “prioritized over all others in the Branch” and commented that “it frankly took too long for us to open this [investigation].”

“Sunshine is the best disinfectant,” the chairmen wrote to Bondi and Patel.

“The American people deserve to know the complete extent of the corruption within the DOJ and FBI that led to the investigation into President Trump. We are making this information public for purposes of public accountability and to provide specific examples of past behavior at your institutions that must not be repeated.

Quite simply, the public has a right to know what happened in Arctic Frost and, based on what we’ve exposed to date, the American public deserves better from its law enforcement agencies.

It is important that every individual at your agencies maintains the highest level of professionalism, and does not allow political bias to motivate or guide their investigative work.”

Within weeks of opening Arctic Frost on April 13, 2022, FBI agents began taking aggressive action to build out their case. The following is a summary of some Arctic Frost investigatory updates, based on unclassified internal FBI records:

Update 1 (April 22-25, 2022):

FBI begins scheduling over a dozen interviews in coordination with 13 FBI field offices.
DOJ and FBI begin the process of acquiring Trump and Pence’s government phones, which were in the Biden White House’s possession.

Update 2 (May 2-3, 2022):

FBI begins analyzing communications between Trump team members and Republican electors.
FBI meets with Justice Department (DOJ) officials to discuss possible search warrants for the Trump and Pence cell phones.

Update 3 (May 10, 2022):

FBI attempts to contact individuals in states throughout the country to schedule interviews.

Update 4 (May 13-17, 2022):

FBI obtains Trump and Pence’s government phones and enters them into evidence for the case.
FBI interviews the first Trump administration’s Deputy White House Counsel.
Additional interviews are planned with Trump administration officials, including employees from the Offices of the President and Vice President, DOJ and former Director of National Intelligence Director John Ratcliffe.
DOJ and FBI begin discussing the possibility of merging the DOJ Office of Inspector General (OIG) investigation, which included former Acting Assistant Attorney General (AAG) for the Civil Division, Jeffrey Clark, with the FBI’s Arctic Frost investigation.
DOJ OIG makes plans to seek search warrants for phones associated with former AAG Jeffrey Clark, John Eastman, Mark Meadows and Ken Klukowski.

Update 5 (May 21-24, 2022):

FBI makes the decision to add former AAG Jeffrey Clark to the Arctic Frost investigation.
FBI drafts a search warrant for the Trump and Pence cell phones in its possession.
Plans continue for additional interviews with former Trump administration officials.

Update 6 (May 27, 2022):

FBI plans to conduct approximately 50 interviews, coupled with subpoenas, across at least seven states during the week of June 20, 2022. Interviews are set to take place with those who “signed and/or mailed the certificates in each state, as well as the Trump Campaign’s Directors of Election Day Operations for the relevant states, and certain GOP officials who are believed to have facilitated the scheme by communicating with individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the ‘fraudulent’ or ‘alternate’ electors.”
The DOJ OIG investigation that includes Jeffrey Clark is formally merged with the FBI Arctic Frost investigation, providing FBI access to phones and email accounts from a variety of DOJ officials, including former Attorney General Bill Barr.

Resources and Staffing

Over the course of just four days in June 2022, the FBI Arctic Frost team spent approximately $16,000 in taxpayer-funded travel to “conduct more than 40 interviews, serve subpoenas and execute several cellular device search warrants.”

Grassley & Johnson Demand Answers

Senators Grassley and Johnson, long-time champions of government transparency, are demanding immediate action.

Their letter to Attorney General Pamela Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel calls for the full disclosure of all internal records, investigative updates, and a complete breakdown of taxpayer dollars wasted on this political persecution.

“The American public deserves better,” the senators declared, condemning the blatant corruption of the Biden administration’s DOJ and FBI.

“The extent to which federal law enforcement weaponized its authority to target Trump and his allies is beyond troubling—it’s a national disgrace.”

Their letter requests that all records related to Arctic Frost be turned over by March 27, 2025.

Read the full letter below:

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