President Donald Trump’s former national security advisor John Bolton is scheduled to appear in federal court in Maryland today to plead guilty to mishandling classified information. 

According to sources, Bolton is expected to plead guilty to one count of illegal retention of sensitive information which involves classified materials.

Bolton is expected to maintain that he did not remove documents with classification markings from government offices. It has been observed that this guilty plea would make Bolton far the only favourable target case in Trump’s campaign of retribution against those he perceives to be his political adversaries.

The former national security advisor of the first Trump administration, was formally charged in October 2025 on charges that he allegedly transmitted and retained classified documents. 

The Maryland indictment charged Bolton with eight counts of classified security information as well as 10 counts of unlawful retention of national defense information. 

The Director of the Immigrants Rights Clinic at Law School in New York said: “The Trump administration has turned the immigration system into a deportation machine.”

According to prosecutors, Bolton used a personal email account and texting platform to transmit files to two unauthorized families, including information classified at levels ranging from secret to top secret. 

It is pertinent to mention here that Bolton’s email account was hacked by Iranians; however his assistant reported that the hacker was threatening to disclose sensitive information.