Federal magistrate judge dismisses charges against two former FBI officials, calls case politically motivated 'rush job'

Hunter Biden is seen in Washington after a 2023 news conference. A federal magistrate judge this week tossed charges against two former FBI officials accused of lying to Congress about a probe into Biden. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call)

By Michael Macagnone

Posted November 2, 2026 at 12:07pm

A federal magistrate judge on Monday threw out a case accusing two former FBI officials of lying to Congress, criticizing it as rushed, flawed and politically motivated.

During an hourlong hearing, Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui for the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia found that there was no legal justification to continue the case against Nicole Floris and Bradley Benavides.

"What has transpired here cannot be described as anything other than weaponization" of government against the pair, the magistrate said, describing it as a "rush job" driven by a political push from President Donald Trump.

Charges Unveiled Last Month

The government unveiled the charges last month, alleging that Floris and Benavides lied to the House Judiciary Committee during interviews in 2023 about their knowledge of a laptop that used to belong to Hunter Biden but was in possession of the FBI ahead of the 2020 election.

Judge Cites Lack of Evidence, Critical Mistakes

Faruqui, in ruling from the bench, said there was no evidence that Floris and Benavides knowingly said anything false to the committee. He also pointed to mistakes throughout the complaint against Floris and Benavides, as well as the probe that led to the charges.

"The rush to charge here led to critical mistakes," Faruqui said.

Faruqui said he has signed off on some 400 criminal complaints in the last five years but had never held such a hearing or ruled against the government during one.

Unusual Three-Day Hearing Preceded Ruling

The ruling came after an unusual three-day hearing last week, which featured hours of testimony from FBI agent Bryan Witt. Witt testified that the investigation came from a direct assignment by FBI Director Kash Patel the morning after a primetime address by Trump in which he called for the prosecution of individuals involved in the agency's shuttered Foreign Influence Task Force.

Floris and Benavides both served in supervisory positions at the task force, and Witt testified that the agency investigated the pair for months before focusing on their 2023 testimony to Congress.

Judge Questions Evidence of False Statements

Faruqui noted that the transcript showed that many of the supposedly false statements were not false and that officials did not do the work to show that Floris and Benavides knew at the time that some of their statements might have been false, a necessary element of the crime.

Statements by Judiciary Committee majority general counsel Steve Castor about the alleged lies were "inadequate, incorrect and not credible," Faruqui said, adding that Castor talked about the impact of the supposed lies in the pair's testimony without having attended the Benavides interview or reviewed the transcript of either interview.

According to Faruqui, the government offered an incomprehensible "word salad" justification as to why the pair might have lied to Congress by arguing they wanted to downplay the task force's role in handling the laptop ahead of the 2020 election.

"It's not close, it's nothing," Faruqui said.

Possible Next Steps

The government could still appeal Faruqui's ruling to Chief Judge James Boasberg or seek a grand jury indictment of the pair. However, Faruqui said it was "self-evident" that the government was avoiding presenting the case before a grand jury, noting he had to pause proceedings several times last week for the government to present grand jury indictments, including one failed one.

"It turns out ham sandwiches are harder to indict these days," Faruqui said, referencing a famous aphorism that a prosecutor "could indict a ham sandwich."

The government would have had to secure an indictment to proceed with the case regardless of his ruling. Faruqui said the decision to proceed with a complaint, coupled with the timing of the case, made him concerned about the political nature of the investigation.

"There is no other event on the calendar except for the midterm elections tomorrow," Faruqui said. "I will not bury my head in the sand."

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