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GOP Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida, right, clarified that the documents were taken months ago, not this week. Regardless of the timing, GOP Sen. Mike Lee of Utah, left, said the act was potentially treasonous.
GOP Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida, right, clarified that the documents were taken months ago, not this week. Regardless of the timing, GOP Sen. Mike Lee of Utah, left, said the act was potentially treasonous. (Kevin Dietsch / Getty Images; Kevin Dietsch / Getty Images)

Update: Chaos as ODNI Denies Multiple Reports That CIA Just Raided Gabbard's Office - Rep. Luna Clarifies Statement - Sen. Lee Suggests Possible Treason

 By Michael Schwarz  May 14, 2026 at 12:31pm
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For a few hours on Wednesday evening, reports suggested that the Central Intelligence Agency had just taken extreme measures.

When the dust settled, however, reports were revised to clarify that the troubling incident — which Utah GOP Sen. Mike Lee called potentially treasonous — actually took place months ago.

Late Wednesday on the social media platform X, Olivia Coleman, press secretary for Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, refuted multiple reports that the CIA had raided Gabbard’s office and seized boxes of files pertaining to the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy and the CIA’s notorious MK Ultra mind-control experiments.

“This is false – the CIA did not raid the DNI’s office,” Coleman wrote on X.

The press secretary shared a since-deleted report from Fox News’ Jesse Watters.

In truth, however, the report originated not with Watters, but with active CIA agent James Erdman III.

On Wednesday, Erdman appeared before Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky’s Senate Homeland Security Committee, where the agent testified regarding Dr. Anthony Fauci’s alleged “intentional” cover-up of the COVID-19 virus’ probable lab origins. Erdman’s testimony reportedly rankled some people at the CIA.

Related:
CIA Accused of Raiding Tulsi Gabbard's Office Seizing JFK, MKUltra Documents Set for Declassification

Then, on X, the news outlet Leading Report credited Erdman with revealing that “CIA seized 40 boxes of JFK and MK-ULTRA files that were being processed by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) for declassification.”

Next, Republican Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida took the report and ran with it.

After sharing the report on X, Luna later spoke to NewsNation’s Katie Pavlich.

“We were actually just notified that the CIA went in and took documents out of ODNI, multiple boxes pertaining to the JFK files as well as MK Ultra,” the congresswoman told Pavlich in a clip posted to X at 6:00 p.m. EST.

That, of course, sounded like the CIA raided Gabbard’s office on Wednesday.

Watters and Fox News reported it that way. And independent journalist Nick Sortor shared Watters’ report in a clip posted to X. (Watters has deleted the report, but Sortor’s shared version of it remains available.)

“HOLY CRAP! The CIA just RAIDED Tulsi Gabbard’s office, and SEIZED documents related to the JFK assassination, MKUltra, and more, that Gabbard was set to declassify … BOXES of them  … The CIA is in DIRECT VIOLATION of a Trump executive order 47 must REEL IN CIA!” Sortor wrote.

Hours later, Luna clarified her original statement.

“Clarification: Took documents that ODNI has jurisdiction over. Also, this did not happen today & was not a ‘raid’ however it did take place and we are just being made aware of it based on reporting etc,” Luna wrote on X at 9:15 p.m. EST, more than three hours after her comments to Pavlich.

Pavlich then reported on X that she had spoken to an intelligence official who said that the CIA took the documents in the middle of the night during last year’s government shutdown, and the agency has not returned them.

Meanwhile, Sortor had some harsh words for Luna, who he blamed for the lack of clarity.

“UPDATE: Members of Congress are once again proving they’re much more interested in being ‘iNfLuEnCeRs’ than members of Congress,”  Sortor wrote on X.

Amid all the chaos, Republican Sen. Mike Lee of Utah remained focused on the CIA’s alleged actions.

First, Lee characterized the CIA’s alleged actions as treasonous, “if true.”

Then, after Luna’s 9:15 p.m. clarification, Lee wrote on X that the timing made no difference. If the agency seized those boxes of files, then it broke the law, he said.

“If CIA took anything from @DNIGabbard, that’s a problem because by law CIA reports to her,” Lee wrote.

The CIA has not commented.

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Michael Schwarz
Michael Schwarz holds a Ph.D. in History and has taught at multiple colleges and universities. He has published one book and numerous essays on Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and the Early U.S. Republic. He loves dogs, baseball, and freedom. After meandering spiritually through most of early adulthood, he has rediscovered his faith in midlife and is eager to continue learning about it from the great Christian thinkers.
Michael Schwarz holds a Ph.D. in History and has taught at multiple colleges and universities. He has published one book and numerous essays on Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and the Early U.S. Republic. He loves dogs, baseball, and freedom. After meandering spiritually through most of early adulthood, he has rediscovered his faith in midlife and is eager to continue learning about it from the great Christian thinkers.




Update: Chaos as ODNI Denies Multiple Reports That CIA Just Raided Gabbard's Office - Rep. Luna Clarifies Statement - Sen. Lee Suggests Possible Treason
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