JUST IN: FBI Deputy Director Andrew Bailey Abruptly Resigns

by Cristina Laila Sep. 28, 2026 10:15 am

FBI Deputy Director Andrew Bailey resigned after one year on the job, according to The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and MSNOW. Andrew Bailey had been overseeing election matters.

Last August, then-Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel tapped then-Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey to serve as Co-Deputy Director of the FBI.

It is unclear why Bailey resigned.

Later Monday morning, Andrew Bailey thanked President Trump, AG Blanche and Kash Patel for the opportunity to serve in the FBI.

“I want to thank President Trump, AG Todd Blanche, and FBI Director Kash Patel for the opportunity to serve in the FBI. Under President Trump’s leadership, we have delivered historic results in our mission to Make America Safe Again,” Bailey said.

“With great pride in what we have accomplished, I am announcing that I am stepping down to return to my family in Missouri. I am confident Director Patel will continue to reform the FBI, combat violent crime, defend the homeland, ensure strong organizational accountability, and restore public trust in this institution of excellence,” Bailey added.

Kash Patel thanked Bailey for his service.

“I want to thank Andrew Bailey for his dedicated service to return the FBI to its core mission and fulfill President Trump’s promise to make America safe again,” Kash Patel said.

“Although Andrew is leaving the FBI in order to return to his family in Missouri, his fantastic contribution instituting critical reforms which resulted in our historic success will live on. Andrew’s leadership at the FBI will be missed but we are grateful he answered the call to serve! Thanks Andrew for your tremendous dedication to the mission of this FBI,” he said.

Bailey is a staunch Trump supporter and fought against crooked prosecutors targeting Trump with lawfare.

Recall that in 2024, Andrew Bailey filed a lawsuit against the State of New York, accusing it of an unconstitutional attack on the democratic process through its legal actions against President Trump.

In 2023, Bailey filed a brief at the US Supreme Court to halt Special Counsel Jack Smith’s move to circumvent the appellate court in his January 6 case against President Trump.

Bailey also took The Gateway Pundit’s blockbuster First Amendment lawsuit against the Biden Administration (formerly MO v Biden) – with TGP’s founder and Editor-in-Chief Jim Hoft as one of the top five plaintiffs – to the US Supreme Court.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2026/09/just-fbi-deputy-director-andrew-bailey-abruptly-resigns/

This story originally was published by Real Clear Wire

By Paul D. Thacker ==1/3=

When Bari Weiss was hired to lead CBS News last year, many of the network’s star reporters feared the centrist founder of The Free Press news site would turn the network into a mouthpiece for the Trump administration. Longtime “60 Minutes” correspondent Scott Pelley was fired after he accused Weiss of “murdering the show.”

If the season premiere of “60 Minutes” is any indication, progressives have little to complain about. In a segment titled “The Pardon Economy,” veteran CBS reporter Lesley Stahl alleges that Trump has upended the way U.S. presidents have dispensed pardons for “100 years or more” by creating a “new system” that involves lobbyists and high-priced “pardon brokers.”

Stahl’s report suggests that Trump has replaced the normal order – in which pardons typically go through an apolitical review by the Justice Department’s Office of the Pardon Attorney– with a scheme that looks like “pay-to-play.” It has already led Democrats to vow they will investigate the issue if they retake the House in the November mid-term elections.

To situate Trump in this “pardon lobbyists” narrative, Stahl links the White House to two convicted con artists who claim close ties to Trump without disclosing one critical detail: There is no evidence the two have ever succeeded in getting anyone a pardon. While their efforts suggest that some in Washington may be trying to capitalize on the narrative about Trump’s alleged corruption – inspired, in part, by questionable pardons he has issued previously – “60 Minutes” offers no concrete proof connecting the administration to these money-making schemes.

Stahl’s report also ignored the long history of wrongdoers paying exorbitant fees for lobbyists to get their pardons viewed by the Oval Office – most famously Bill Clinton’s brother, Roger, and Hillary’s brothers, Hugh and Tony Rodham.

Although Stahl’s report quotes Trump officials denying her claims, a DOJ official who was outraged by her “misleading” report provided RealClearInvestigations with documents showing that well-connected D.C. insiders are routinely involved in the pardon process.

Leaked Documents

The DOJ documents shared with RCI involve the high-profile and controversial pre-emptive pardons issued by President Biden to Trump antagonists on his final day in office in 2025 – specifically top NIH official Anthony Fauci, U.S. Army Gen. Mark Milley, and former Congresswoman Liz Cheney.

The release of pardon documents is highly unusual. Pardon documents are zealously guarded by the White House, in part because they can reveal lobbying and political considerations – the very matter Stahl’s report insinuates is novel under Trump. The official shared them under the condition that screenshots of the documents not be made public out of concern they might anger Trump, who has pushed for criminal investigations of document leaks.

The official noted that there is no evidence that “pardon brokers” put on camera by CBS have influenced the president and said that the documents were being released specifically to show that many pardon recipients retain expensive legal counsel to represent them. And despite the assertion in the “60 Minutes” report that pardons under prior administrations normally required admitting guilt, none of the three – or any of those pardoned by Biden, including his family members – has expressed the slightest contrition.

What the leaked documents – the letters Milley, Cheney and Fauci sent accepting the pardons – do show is that Fauci, Milley, and Cheney were all using the services of high-

priced attorneys at politically connected law firms. They do not, however, provide any insight into how the pardons came about. Milley and Cheney’s letters to Biden were sent through attorneys at Williams & Connolly, a top-tier, white-shoe law firm based in Washington, D.C., that has long represented a wide range of powerful Democrats and Republicans.

Now a retired congressional investigator, Jason Foster helped to lead the House investigation of the Clinton pardon scandal. He said the Fauci, Milley, and Cheney pardon papers raise questions about when their attorneys first contacted the Justice Department and the Biden White House about the pardons.

“Based on my experience leading these investigations in the past, this is clearly not a first interaction their attorneys are having with the administration,” Foster said.“This doesn’t mean they’ve done anything wrong, but there’s no constitutional requirement that anyone go through the pardon attorney office.”

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2026/09/60-minutes-airs-misleading-report-trump-pardons/

>>25085152

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First Contact?

Williams & Connolly attorneys did not respond to RCI’s questions asking when they first contacted the Biden administration about pardons for retired General Milley and former Congresswoman Cheney. Nor did they answer questions regarding how much they charged for this work.

Records show that Fauci also had an attorney, David Schertler, send the letter accepting the pardon. That letter, however, was addressed not to the Justice Department, but to Biden’s White House Counsel.

“On behalf of Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, we appreciate the President’s consideration and his action this morning on Dr. Fauci’s behalf,” reads the letter Schertler sent to Edward Siskel, Biden’s top legal advisor. “Dr. Fauci accepts the President’s pardon.”

Fauci emailed the Hill and contacted reporters at Reuters and other outlets that same day, claiming that the White House approached him about the pardon a month prior and that he did not ask for one. He added, “I have committed no crime and there are no possible grounds for any allegation or threat of criminal investigation or prosecution of me.”

At a July Senate hearing, Senator Ashley Moody asked Fauci whether he spoke with President Biden and asked for the pardon. “On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer based upon my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution,” Fauci replied. When asked multiple follow-up questions about how he got his pardon, Fauci again asserted his Fifth Amendment rights – as he did to every other question he was asked on a wide range of topics, including the color of his tie.

RCI emailed David Schertler extensive questions, asking when he first contacted the Justice Department and the White House about Fauci’s pardon. RCI also asked about his communications with attorneys in the pardon office and how much his firm charged Fauci for help with the pardon.

Schertler did not respond to RCI’s questions asking when he first contacted the Biden administration about Fauci’s pardon and how much his firm charged the former NIH official for pardon work.

Hidden Cameras

The centerpiece of the “60 Minutes” “pardon lobbyist” segment was an undercover investigation of Jack Burkman and Jacob Wohl, two characters offering to secure pardons for $300,000. But almost every fact detailed by “60 Minutes” on Burkman and Wohl had already been reported six months earlier by The New York Times.

Burkman and Wohl are conservative activists who were convicted of felonies for a robocall scheme to frighten black people against voting by mail in the 2020 presidential election, the Times reported. The two now work as lobbyists who allege special access to Trump and influencers such as Laura Loomer.

The Times reporting established that Burkman and Wohl were selling their alleged access to secure pardons. The newspaper, for example, reported on an audio recording in which Burkman said that he and Wohl “use a combination of influencers and members of Congress,” as well as going “direct to the president, and I think that’s a very good approach.”

White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis emailed RCI that the Trump administration has a “robust pardon review process,” and President Trump makes the final decision.“Anyone spending money to lobby for pardons is foolishly wasting their money and the President doesn’t even know who these so-called ‘lobbyists’ are.”

“60 Minutes” also regurgitated details first reported last March in the Times of Burkman’s lobbying for pardons on behalf of nursing home owner Joseph Schwartz, who paid Burkman’s firm almost $1 million, and the rapper Torrence Ivy Hatch Jr., known as Boosie BadAzz, who paid the pair $600,000.

To create TV drama, “60 Minutes” worked with convicted felon Ammon Covino, who met with Burkman and Wohl at the Ritz-Carlton. “60 Minutes” recorded the interaction with hidden cameras. To make Burkman and Wohl look good, Stahl introduced them to listeners as purported accomplished “pardon brokers.”

“They claim they got one for this owner of a nursing home chain convicted of massive tax fraud,” Stahl said. “He paid them nearly a million dollars for their promise to reach the president.”

This is misleading. The Times reported that nursing home owner Joseph Schwartz stopped paying Burkman and Wohl after they failed to get him a pardon, a detail “60 Minutes” seems to have ignored. In fact, there is no evidence that Burkman and Wohl have gotten a pardon for anyone. Instead, Burkman and Wohl make money off felons by promising pardons that never seem to materialize.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2026/09/60-minutes-airs-misleading-report-trump-pardons/

>>25085156

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RCI sent CBS News an extensive list of questions, noting apparent contradictions in their reporting, such as failing to note that two felons they recorded by hidden camera claiming they can get pardons have never actually gotten anyone a pardon. CBS News did not respond to these questions. A spokesperson sent this statement: “60 MINUTES stands behind our reporting and the investigative work our team did to shed light on the pardons process.”

Instead of advancing a narrative about a “new system” of “pardon lobbyists,” “60 Minutes” seems to have recycled key findings from the Clinton pardon scandal of 2001, while claiming their reporting has uncovered something new and unique about pardons in the Trump administration.

Clinton Pardon Scandals

During his final hours in office, President Bill Clinton signed a flurry of pardons that led to a years-long scandal that found his own brother, Roger Clinton, had accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars to lobby for pardons, as did brothers of first lady Hillary Clinton and an attorney who worked on her Senate campaign that year.

“Pardon for Felon Considered After Kin Paid Roger Clinton,” reported the New York Times in 2001 regarding a $50,000 payment to Roger by the family of Rosario Gambino, a convicted heroin trafficker and reputed organized crime figure. Just as Burkman and Wohl make wild claims of pardon success but never seem to deliver, the Gambino family told the Times that Roger Clinton led them to believe that a pardon for Rosario was a “lock.”

While Roger Clinton failed to get anyone a pardon, House investigators released a 2002 report that found that he accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars to lobby for pardons. However, one person who did succeed in lobbying the Clinton administration for a pardon was Hillary Clinton’s brother, Hugh Rodham.

Two felons – a convicted drug dealer and a businessman who marketed a bogus baldness cure – paid Hugh Rodham a combined $400,000 to get them pardons, which included lobbying White House staff. House investigators found that Rodham’s lobbying efforts also involved telling White House staff that one of the pardons was “very important” to First Lady Clinton.

The House investigation also detailed similar actions by Hillary’s other brother, Tony Rodham, who secured pardons over the objection of the Justice Department by lobbying his brother-in-law, President Bill Clinton: “Tony Rodham lobbied President Clinton to grant pardons to Edgar and Vonna Jo Gregory while he was receiving substantial sums of money from the Gregorys.”

The findings that felons had hired both Bill and Hillary’s family members to lobby the Clinton White House for pardons were widely covered by news outlets, including reporters at CBS News. Stahl joined the CBS News Washington bureau in the early 1970s and moved to “60 Minutes” in 1991, almost a decade before the Clinton scandal became national news. So it’s hard to understand how she missed these details of the Clinton pardon scandal to now claim the Trump administration has created a new “pardon economy,” as “60 Minutes” calls its news segment.

More Trump Probes

Although Stahl’s “60 Minutes” segment did not support its claim that Trump has created a unique new system for pardons, it is already prompting fresh partisan attacks against the president. In an online story that followed the “60 Minutes” piece, CBS News reported that Democrats were alarmed by the undercover video: “Senior Democratic lawmakers vowed Monday to investigate the new market that has sprung up around President Trump’s pardons, citing CBS News video of lobbyists offering to ‘put pressure on the president’ in exchange for a hefty fee from a convicted felon.”

Now the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, Congressman Jamie Raskin will likely lead these investigations. Raskin told CBS News that pardons are “kind of an underground market because not everybody knows how to get to it.”

CBS News failed to report, however, that one of the people who benefited from this underground market was Raskin himself, who Biden pardoned along with Liz Cheney on his final day in office.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2026/09/60-minutes-airs-misleading-report-trump-pardons/

SpaceX Launches Classified U.S. Space Force Mission in California

by Anthony Scott Sep. 28, 2026 9:15 am

The partnership between SpaceX and the U.S. Space Force has been essential to the United States’ quest for space superiority.

On Saturday, that partnership continued when SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket, carrying a classified payload for the U.S. Space Force, was launched from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.

The launch was part of Space Force’s USSF-385 mission, but details regarding that mission have been classified.

SpaceX reported residents in Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, and Ventura counties may have heard a sonic boom from the launch.

Per KTLA: SpaceX launched a mysterious, classified U.S. Space Force mission from California Saturday morning, with little publicly known about what was sent into orbit or where it was headed.

A Falcon 9 rocket carrying the USSF-385 mission lifted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base on California’s Central Coast at 7 a.m.

The mission’s payloads, their activities and even their exact destination are classified, according to Space.com.

SpaceX also cut off its launch webcast shortly after the Falcon 9’s first-stage booster returned to Earth. The company typically ends broadcasts early during national security missions rather than showing the deployment of classified payloads, Space.com reported.

WATCH:

$SPCX just launched USSF-385 on B1100 which is the 100th Falcon 9 Block 5 booster SpaceX has built.

The mission is carrying a classified Space Force payload but the thick fog at Vandenberg made the launch clip look incredible.

Post

Shay Boloor on X: "$SPCX just launched USSF-385 on B1100 which is the 100th Falcon 9 Block 5 booster SpaceX has built. The mission is carrying a classified Space Force payload but the thick fog at Vandenberg made the launch clip look incredible."

The launch comes two weeks after Air Force Secretary Troy Meink confirmed the U.S. military has weapons in space.

Meink made the announcement during the Air, Space, and Cyber Conference held in Maryland.

The Air Force Secretary stated that the U.S. has “on-orbit space control weapons capable of defending the Joint Force against hostile adversary action.”

In response to Meink’s announcement, both Russia and China warned the U.S. that space is no place for a “battlefield.”

The launch comes two weeks after Air Force Secretary Troy Meink confirmed the U.S. military has weapons in space.

Meink made the announcement during the Air, Space, and Cyber Conference held in Maryland.

The Air Force Secretary stated that the U.S. has “on-orbit space control weapons capable of defending the Joint Force against hostile adversary

action.”

In response to Meink’s announcement, both Russia and China warned the U.S. that space is no place for a “battlefield.”

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2026/09/spacex-launches-classified-u-s-space-force-mission/

Escalation watch: West ramping up war rhetoric, ‘terror plotters’ given bail in UK

RT tracks the latest wave of psyops and propaganda from the UK and its allies

War rhetoric from the UK and its Western European allies has reached a fever pitch, with British elites warning of an imminent clash with Russia and blaming Iran for a bizarre plot uncovered at a US airbase.With no letup in sight, RT is tracking the escalation and debunking the psyops in real time.

Five Britons probed over suspected bomb plot outside US air base.

In the space of a single week, retired British generals told the BBC that the public must be “psychologically prepared” for conflict with Russia, a Labour Party thought leader suggested that dissidents and Russia sympathizers be “locked up,” and former Brexit Minister Jacob Rees-Mogg told British men and women that they “may have to die” in a cataclysmic European war.

This was a marked shift in rhetoric from the British elite. Since 2022, five successive prime ministers have insisted that the UK will arm Ukraine “for as long as it takes” to inflict a strategic defeat on Russia, but only a handful of bellicose generals and analysts have predicted an imminent military clash with Moscow. The tactical situation has not changed, and Russia has repeatedly insisted it has no interest in a wider conflict with NATO, but talking heads from both the Labour and Conservative parties are now speaking of war as a done deal.

Meanwhile, Sky News ran ‘The Wargame’ all week – a bizarre five-episode reality show in which real politicians and military chiefs gamed out a hypothetical Russian invasion for the cameras.

On the continent, Spain’s El Mundo claimed that the CIA had learned of a potential Russian plan to launch drones at France, Italy, or Spain from ships in the Mediterranean. The claim, attributed to Lithuanian intelligence, was quickly shot down by Paris and Rome, as Finnish President Alexander Stubb appealed for calm across the West.

Stubb’s call has apparently fallen on deaf ears in the UK, where Foreign Secretary Ed Milliband described a baffling bomb plot at a US airbase on Monday as an example of “the threats our country faces,” before declaring that theBritish people must “fight for our values” – without saying against whom or what those values are.

The stakes – and the likelihood of miscalculation – are high. RT is watching and listening, and debunking the most outrageous war propaganda in real time.

https://www.rt.com/news/646370-uk-fairford-escalation-rhetoric-russia/

Russia is not wrong, the EU has been accusing Russia of invading the continent for all the years the Ukraine bullshit has been going on, to justify to start a war with Russia, while accusing Russia of their own plans.