Twelve former FBI agents have initiated legal proceedings to reclaim their positions, asserting they were unlawfully fired after kneeling during a racial justice protest in Washington in 2020. The agents contend their actions were a bid to de-escalate a volatile situation and were not a political statement.
In their lawsuit, filed on Monday, the agents claim Director Kash Patel terminated them in September because they were seen as lacking political alignment with President Donald Trump. They argue their decision to take a knee on June 4, 2020, shortly after George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police, has been wrongly interpreted as a political expression.
