WASHINGTON DC -- Just days before the United States launched a major military operation in Iran, FBI Director Kash Patel fired a dozen agents and staff members from a counterintelligence unit tasked with monitoring threats from Iran, according to two sources familiar with the matter.

They were ousted for a simple reason: Each was involved in the investigation of President Donald Trump’s alleged retention of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate.

As a result, Patel hamstrung the Washington, DC-based FBI counterintelligence unit, known as CI-12, which handles cases ranging from mishandling of classified documents to tracking foreign spies operating on US soil.

The dismissals have added to concern inside the Justice Department and FBI that counterterrorism and intelligence investigations in the wake of the military operation in Iran could be hampered by a mass exodus of national security experts, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter.

And like the CI-12 unit, several senior officials were ousted or reassigned because of their involvement in Trump-related investigations, sources say. The removals have cost the Justice Department and FBI decades of combined experience in identifying the types of threats that sources say could appear in the wake of Operation Epic Fury.

The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The FBI declined to comment on personnel matters but told CNN in a statement the bureau “maintains a robust counterintelligence operation, with personnel all over the country.”

“Our teams remain fully engaged across the country and [are] prepared to mobilize any security assets needed to assist federal partners – as well as state and local law enforcement,” an FBI spokesperson said.

The New York Sun first reported that employees from the CI-12 unit had been targeted in last week’s firings.

Iranian threats

In Trump’s first term, CI-12 was instrumental in tracking potential threats from the Iranian regime in retaliation for the 2020 drone strike that killed Gen. Qasem Soleimani, then-leader of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force.

Iranian-backed actors have since been charged with plots to assassinate American officials that Iran has blamed for Soleimani’s death, including Trump, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and former national security advisor John Bolton.

The threats have continued despite years of law enforcement disruptions, according to a joint FBI and Department of Homeland Security report obtained by CNN.

The unclassified report, which was written last August, described Iran’s security services as “adaptable and opportunistic” and outlined how the nation has recruited operatives abroad whose identities obfuscate Iranian involvement, such as biker gang members and drug traffickers, and how operatives have used codewords, burner phones and cryptocurrency in such plots.

There is nothing to indicate there have been any increased threats or activated “sleeper agents” since the US first launched strikes against Iran, one person told CNN. Domestic law enforcement has nonetheless heightened their monitoring for threats as is typical after military conflict abroad.

Manpower cut in half

Justice Department agents and prosecutors have for decades worked to identify and thwart threats from Iranian-backed actors on American soil, particularly the regime’s penchant for assassinations or kidnapping plots.

But like CI-12, DOJ teams dedicated to monitoring those foreign threats have been decimated by waves of firings and resignations since the beginning of the Trump administration, and experts worry that despite their best efforts, the department could be unprepared to manage future attacks.

Many of the offices in the DOJ’s National Security Division have lost at least half of their employees, people familiar with the matter told CNN, including the office dedicated to counterterrorism. And senior FBI officials who oversaw counterintelligence and international terrorism efforts have been pushed out.

To be sure, the FBI and DOJ have investigated and brought many national security and terrorism related cases in the last year, including against individuals who supported Iran financially, stole trade secrets or threatened individuals on US soil.

But current and former prosecutors, investigators and employees who spoke to CNN on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution described a lack of manpower that made it difficult to fully monitor threats to national security.

“If you lose half your capacity, you lose half your ability,” one former senior DOJ official told CNN of the national security teams. “That in itself is a reason to be concerned.”

The dismantling of the National Security Division began early in the Trump administration. Attorney General Pam Bondi published a series of memos on her first day that paused all investigations into corporate foreign bribery, curtailed enforcement of a foreign agent registration law and deemphasized the criminal prosecutions of Russian oligarchs.

The head of the DOJ’s counterintelligence office was pushed out, as was the person who led the division’s office of law and policy; the division’s executive officer; and at least three other senior officials.

Some of the officials were transferred to other jobs inside the DOJ where they would have less influence on big decisions. In one instance, Bondi demoted the National Security Division’s acting head because she saw a portrait of former President Joe Biden was still hanging in the division’s front office. He was replaced by Trump’s official nominee to the position.

The mass departures have led to a distrust between the remaining career officials and the DOJ’s political leaders, sources said, and has left the division “completely gutted and undermined.”

Some National Security Division employees told CNN that they have been sent into meetings without the full details of a case, investigation or intelligence. One former official told CNN that prosecutors dedicated to the National Security Council have gone into meetings without “key context” on council is discussing that day, hampering their ability to give the official views of the department on high-level national security matters and leaving them “feeling crazy.”

Manpower was further affected by the monthslong review of the Epstein files, as some attorneys and FBI agents who typically work on national security matters were instead tasked with redacting documents before their public release.

“You just put blinders on and hope you don’t get tapped to do something political,” one former official said. “Don’t let the mission change.”

CNN’s Curt Devine contributed to this report.

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