Charles McGonigal

Last updated
Charles McGonigal
BornJune 23, 1968 (age 55)
Education Kent State University (B.B.A.) Johns Hopkins University (M.A.)
Employer FBI (1996-2018)
Criminal statusIncarcerated
Conviction(s)
  • Conspiring to Violate U.S. Sanctions on Russia
  • Concealing Information from the FBI
Criminal penalty78 months in prison
Imprisoned at FCI Sandstone [1]

Charles McGonigal (born June 23, 1968) [2] is a former American Federal Bureau of Investigation special agent in charge of counterintelligence in the FBI's New York City field office. In 2016 and 2017, as a supervisor in the New York Office, he led investigations into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections and Russian efforts to aid Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, including by Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska. In December 2023 McGonigal was sentenced to 50 months in prison for conspiring with Deripaska to violate U.S. sanctions on Russia. [3] In February 2024, McGonigal was sentenced to an additional 28 months in prison for concealing payments he received from a former Albanian intelligence employee. [4] [5] [6] [7] During McGonigal’s time in a supervisory position in the New York Field Office, the office was marked by controversial leaks.

Contents

Education

In 1990, McGonigal was awarded a B.B.A. from Kent State University, [8] later earning an M.A. in government from Johns Hopkins University in 2014. [9] [10]

Career

Federal Bureau of Investigation

McGonigal joined the Federal Bureau of Investigation in 1996, working in New York, Washington, Baltimore and Cleveland. [6]

At the start of his career, McGonigal worked on the investigation into the 1996 TWA Flight 800 crash headed by the boss of the New York office, James Kallstrom; Kallstrom was close to both then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani and flamboyant real estate developer and tabloid newspaper staple Donald Trump. [11] [12] “We just got to be friends,” said Kallstrom of Trump in a 2020 interview. [13]

In 2002, McGonigal was appointed a supervisory special agent in the Counter-Espionage Section at FBI Headquarters.

In 2006, he became field supervisor of a counter-espionage squad at the Washington Field Office. He was one of the original case agents assigned to the Russian sleeper agents Illegals Program.

McGonigal led the 2010 investigation into the United States diplomatic cables leak of over 200,000 State Department documents, and the investigation into Chelsea Manning's collaboration with WikiLeaks. [14] [15]

By early 2016, McGonigal was running the bureau's Cyber-Counterintelligence Coordination Section in Washington, where agents analyzed Russian and Chinese hacking and other foreign intelligence activities. [8] In that senior position, Mr. McGonigal became aware of the initial criminal referral that led to the investigation known as Crossfire Hurricane into contacts between the Trump campaign and Russia in the 2016 election. [8]

On October 4, 2016, FBI Director James B. Comey appointed McGonigal "Special Agent in Charge of the Counterintelligence Division for the New York Field Office”. [9] McGonigal was an expert on Russian intelligence activities targeting the United States, as well as U.S. efforts to recruit Russian spies. [6] As head of counterintelligence efforts in New York, McGonigal was involved in some of the bureau's most sensitive work, [6] including Crossfire Hurricane. [16]

Investigation of Oleg Deripaska

McGonigal supervised and participated in investigations of Russian oligarchs, including Oleg Deripaska, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, who figured repeatedly in U.S. investigations into contacts between Russia and the Trump Campaign. [17] [18] [6] [7] On August 15, 2023, McGonigal would plead guilty to federal charges of conspiring with Deripaska to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) and money laundering. [18]

In a February 7, 2023 letter to the Department of Justice requesting information after McGonigal’s arrest, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse wrote,

“The situation is even more troubling given that McGonigal was arrested for, among other things, allegedly working with Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, whom McGonigal was assigned to investigate while working for the FBI. Deripaska, a known associate of Trump 2016 campaign chairman Paul Manafort, was sanctioned for interfering with the 2016 presidential election to help Donald Trump. [19] ”

According to Yale professor Timothy Snyder, a leading authority on Russia and Ukraine, “Russia was backing Trump in much the way that it had once backed Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych” in the 2010 Ukrainian presidential election. [20] Deripaska had financed and coordinated the political operation to install Yanukovych, and hired Paul Manafort to run Yakuovuch’s campaign. [21] The same Paul Manafort who was now running Trump’s presidential campaign.

On October 30, 2017, Manafort was indicted by a federal grand jury and arrested by the FBI as part of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into the Trump campaign. [22] [23] Manafort was charged with conspiracy against the United States, conspiracy to launder money, acting as an unregistered foreign agent, and making false statements. [24] [25] Prosecutors claimed Manafort laundered more than $18 million he’d received from Deripaska as compensation for lobbying and consulting services in Yanukovych’s campaign. [25] [26]

In 2016, when McGonigal was investigating Deripaska, the FBI was aware that Manafort owed Deripaska millions of dollars; [27] and that Manafort had provided the Russian oligarch with election information as a way of paying off the debt. [28] [29] On August 2, 2016, Manafort and Rick Gates had met with Deripaska associate Konstantin Kilimnik (a Russian Intelligence agent according to the US Government) at the Grand Havana Room at 666 Fifth Avenue owned by Jared Kushner’s family. [30] At the meeting, Manafort passed internal Trump Campaign polling data to Kilimnik. [31] This internal Trump Campaign polling data would have aided the Russian Internet Research Agency, run by Russian oligarch Yevgeny Prigozhin, in focusing it's online election interference efforts. On 16 February 2018, a United States grand jury indicted 13 Russian nationals and three Russian entities, including the Internet Research Agency, on charges of violating criminal laws with the intent to interfere "with U.S. elections and political processes". [32]

Leaks from the New York Office During McGonigal’s Tenure

During McGonigal's time in a supervisory position in New York, the office was marked by many leaks. On October 26, 2016, two days before FBI director James Comey announced he was reopening the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails, Trump Campaign surrogate Rudy Giuliani told Fox News:

“I do think that all of these revelations about Hillary Clinton are beginning to have an impact. I think [Donald Trump’s] got a surprise or two that you’re going to hear about in the next few days. I mean, I’m talking about some pretty big surprises… We’ve got a couple of things up our sleeve that should turn this thing around.” [33]

Two day later, on October 28, 2016, Giuliani, appearing on the Lars Larson show, said:

"There’s a kind of revolution going on inside the FBI about the original [July] conclusion being completely unjustified and almost a slap in the face of the FBI’s integrity... And I know that from former agents. I know that even from a few active agents who, obviously, don’t want to identify themselves… I think [Comey] is feeling the pressure of a group of FBI agents who, you know, don’t look at it politically….” [34]

On October 31, 2016, the New York Times published an article titled “Investigating Donald Trump, F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia”, which cited unnamed “Intelligence officials”. [35] The article’s title appeared to prematurely clear Trump of Russia ties days before the 2016 election, and days before the FBI would publicly announce it was reopening its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails.

While the article noted that “F.B.I. officials declined to comment”, it cited unnamed “Intelligence officials” who “spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a continuing national security investigation.” “[T]he article’s tone and headline… gave an air of finality to an investigation that was just beginning.” [36] “The article… received a great deal of hindsight-aided scrutiny for the role it may have played in easing voters’ concerns about ties between Donald Trump and Russia” right before the 2016 election. [37]

The leaks from unnamed “Intelligence officials” in the New York Times story surprised and angered former British Intelligence officer Christopher Steele, who had been compiling an opposition research report that would become known as the Steele Dossier, and speaking to the FBI about connections he had uncovered between the Trump Campaign and Russian. [38] Between the leaks from unnamed “Intelligence officials” and Comey’s October 28 letter, Steele became concerned that someone was manipulating the FBI for political purposes and stopped dealing with the FBI in his investigation of Trump. [38]

On November 4, 2016, Giuliani was asked on Fox News about his October 26, 2016 comments:

STEVE DOOCY: Two – a couple days before this all broke, you’re on with Martha McCallum, and you looked at Martha and go, well look out, something’s coming down, and certainly it did. What did you know? And a lot of other networks are pointing that out.

RUDY GIULIANI: Well, it’s very simple.

BRIAN KILMEADE: - as if you were part of that?

RUDY GIULIANI: I’m not part of it at all. All I heard were former FBI agents telling me that there’s a revolution going on inside the FBI and it’s now at a boiling point. [39]

On June 15, 2018, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes told Fox News’s Laura Ingraham:

“[W]e had whistle blowers that came to us in late September of 2016, who talked to us about this laptop sitting up in New York that had additional emails on it... Good FBI agents brought this to our attention...” [40]

On December 7, 2018, James Comey testified to the House Intelligence Committee that he opened an investigation into the leaks coming from the New York office:

“I was concerned that there appeared to be in the media a number of stories that might have been based on communications reporters or nonreporters like Rudy Giuliani were having with people in the New York field office. In particular,… Mr. Giuliani was making statements that appeared to be based on his knowledge of workings inside the FBI New York. And… there were other stories that were in the same ballpark that gave me a general concern that we may have a leak problem… out of New York, and so I asked that it be investigated.” [41] [42]

In testimony to the Intelligence Inspector General, former attorney general Loretta Lynch relayed a conversation she had with Comey:

“And then I said, now, we’ve got to talk about the New York office in general. And he said yes. And I said we both work with them. We both know them. We both, you know, think highly of them. I said, but this has become a problem. And he said, and he said to me that it had become clear to him… that there is a cadre of senior people in New York who have a deep and visceral hatred of Secretary Clinton. And he said it is, it is deep… [H]e said it was surprising to him or stunning to him…, and it was hard to manage because these were agents that were very, very senior, or had even had timed out and were staying on, and therefore did not really feel under pressure from headquarters…” [43]

In a February 7, 2023 letter to the Department of Justice requesting information about McGonigal, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse wrote,

“Because McGonigal was the Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s New York Field Office counterintelligence division in the weeks leading to the 2016 election, he may have knowledge of or have participated in political activities to damage then-candidate Hillary Clinton and help then-candidate Donald Trump. For instance, during that time period, Rudy Giuliani announced that a “big surprise” related to Secretary Clinton would be forthcoming from the FBI, hinting he received that information from the New York Field Office.1 The very next day, Director James Comey, reportedly bowing to internal pressure from that office, broke the FBI’s ordinary policy of declining to comment on ongoing matters close to an election and announced the FBI would reopen its investigation into Secretary Clinton’s use of a private email server. [44] ”

During his time in a senior position in the New York Field Office, McGonigal was perfectly positioned to have knowledge of or have participated in these leaks. [45] “After assuming his new job in October 2016, just a month before the election, [McGonigal] would have been in a position to undermine the bureau’s investigation into Deripaska and Manafort and to sabotage those investigations with disinformation. Similarly, he would have been in a position to leak the information [to Rudy Giuliani and Devin Nunez] about Anthony Weiner’s laptop that led to the reopening of the FBI probe into Hillary Clinton’s emails 11 days before the election. Finally, he was in a position to have been a source behind the false exculpatory news published by The New York Times on October 31, 2016, a week before the election, with the headline that seemed to give to Trump a clean bill of health: “Investigating Donald Trump, F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia.”” [46]

Senior FBI Special Agent Johnathan Buma played a pivotal role in the Bureau’s investigation into Giuliani for illegal foreign-lobbying activity and campaign-finance violations. [47] In a twenty-two-page whistleblower statement, Buma alleged that agency leaders had moved repeatedly to squash his investigation into Russian and Ukrainian ties to Giuliani. [47] Buma’s whistleblower statement singled out McGonigal by name as one of the agency leaders who had run interference for Giuliani. [47]

From spring 2016 through late 2018, during his time in the New York Office, McGonigal was in a relationship with Allison Guerriero, who was a friend of Rudy Giuliani. [15] Guerriero has stated on social media that were no connections between Giuliani and McGonigal. [48]

In March 2017, McGonigal expressed concern in a text message to then-FBI Deputy Assistant Director of the Counterintelligence Division Jennifer Boone that the surveillance warrant application on Carter Page could leak to the public after being presented to the United States House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. [49]

McGonigal retired from the FBI in 2018. [50]

Private sector

In September 2018, McGonigal was hired as a vice-president at Brookfield Properties. [51]

In the spring of 2022, McGonigal was hired as the global head of security for Aman Resorts. McGonigal's hiring was done through a very obscure process and raised many eyebrows there, according to Aman staffers, as the previous director of corporate security had been reassigned for no apparent reason, and McGonigal continued to be retained by the company even after news first surfaced that he was under investigation. [2] [52] [53]

Federal charges

In January 2023, McGonigal was arrested and indicted on federal charges of money laundering, making false statements in mandatory disclosures to the FBI, violating U.S. sanctions on Russia, and other counts. The indictment alleged that McGonigal worked with Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, whom McGonigal had investigated as part of the FBI's Operation Crossfire Hurricane. Deripaska tasked McGonigal with investigating one of Deripaska's rivals. McGonigal used shell companies to conduct his business with Deripaska. [54]

According to the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control, Deripaska is an agent of Vladimir Putin. Deripaska played a key role in financing Putin's efforts to take over Ukraine from within via a political operation directed by Paul Manafort that put Putin surrogate Viktor Yanukovych in the Ukraine presidency in 2010.[ citation needed ]

McGonigal was separately indicted for allegedly accepting payments amounting to more than US$225,000 from a former Albanian intelligence employee and acting to advance that person's interests. Days after his arrest, McGonigal was released on $500,000 bond after pleading not guilty. [50] [55]

The FBI's investigation into McGonigal reportedly began sometime in 2018, after McGonigal was seen meeting with a Russian contact who was under surveillance by British authorities. [56]

On August 15, 2023, McGonigal pleaded guilty to federal charges of conspiring to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) and money laundering in connection with a 2021 agreement to provide services to Deripaska, a sanctioned Russian oligarch. [57]

In December 2023, McGonigal was sentenced to four years in prison after pleading guilty to working for Deripaska. [58] [59]

In February 2024, McGonigal was sentenced to an additional 28 months in prison for concealing the payments he received from Agron Neza, a former Albanian intelligence employee. [4] [5] [6] [7]

Personal life

McGonigal and his wife Pamela have two children. They have a home in Chevy Chase, Maryland. McGonigal's family did not accompany him during his counterintelligence tour in New York. [8]

From around spring 2017 to late 2018, McGonigal reportedly maintained an extramarital relationship with Allison Guerriero, a resident of Florham Park, New Jersey who socialized with law enforcement officers. [60] [61] During the affair, McGonigal and Guerriero frequently stayed at his apartment in the Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York. [8]

In 2021, when Guerriero was badly burned during a fire at her father's house, Rudy Giuliani, whom she knew from law-enforcement circles, let her stay in a guest bedroom at his home. [62] Since then, Guerriero has been a frequent on-air caller to Giuliani's radio shows. [62]

McGonigal kept framed portraits of himself shaking hands with Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama as well as former Kosovo Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj in his home office. [63]

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  29. ↑ "Report On The Investigation Into Russian Interference In The 2016 Presidential Election - Volume I". U.S. Department of Justice.
  30. ↑ LaFraniere, Sharon; Vogel, Kenneth P.; Shane, Scott (February 10, 2019). "In Closed Hearing, a Clue About 'the Heart' of Mueller's Russia Inquiry". The New York Times.
  31. ↑ Helderman, Rosalind S.; Hamburger, Tom (February 12, 2019). "How Manafort's 2016 contact with Russian goes to 'heart' of Mueller's probe". The Washington Post .
  32. ↑ Mangan, Dan; Calia, Mike (February 16, 2018). "Special counsel Mueller: Russians conducted 'information warfare' against US to help Trump win". CNBC. Retrieved February 16, 2018.
  33. ↑ Barrett, Wayne (November 3, 2016). "Meet Donald Trump's Top FBI Fanboy". Daily Beast.
  34. ↑ "GIULIANI: 'There's a revolution going on inside the FBI, and it's now at a boiling point'". Business Insider.
  35. ↑ Lichtblau, Eric; Myers, Steven Lee (October 31, 2016). "Investigating Donald Trump, F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia". The New York Times.
  36. ↑ Apuzzo, Matt; Goldman, Adam; Fandos, Nicholas (May 16, 2018). "Code Name Crossfire Hurricane: The Secret Origins of the Trump Investigation". The New York Times.
  37. ↑ "New York Times acknowledges it buried the lead in pre-election Russia-Trump story". Washington Post.
  38. 1 2 "The making of the Steele dossier". The Washington Post. February 6, 2018.
  39. ↑ "With Four Days to Go, the Presidential Race is Closing Ugly". NBC. November 4, 2016.
  40. ↑ "Schiff: Nunes Didn't Share FBI Agents' Tip About Clinton Emails On Weiner Laptop". Talking Points Memo. June 17, 2018.
  41. ↑ "James Comey Finally Spilled Why He Went Public About Hillary Clinton's Emails in 2016". Esquire. December 10, 2018.
  42. ↑ "INTERVIEW OF: JAMES COMEY" (PDF). House Intelligence Committee.
  43. ↑ "There may have been an FBI conspiracy involving the 2016 election. But not the one you think". Washington Post.
  44. ↑ "Letter to DOJ" (PDF). Senator Sheldon Whitehead.
  45. ↑ "Letter to DOJ" (PDF). Senator Sheldon Whitehead.
  46. ↑ Unger, Craig (February 2023). "Did the FBI's Charles McGonigal Help Throw the 2016 Election to Trump?". The New Republic.
  47. 1 2 3 Kirkpatrick, David D. (August 14, 2023). "Is the F.B.I. Truly Biased Against Trump?". New Yorker.
  48. ↑ Guerriero, Allison [@AllisonGuerrier] (January 6, 2024). "Mr. Giuliani is someone I have known my entire adult life. There is ZERO connection between him and Charles McGonigal to my knowledge and I never introduced them when Charlie and I were living together in Park Slope in his apartment there. You're barking up the wrong tree" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  49. ↑ "DOJ Docs Combined" (PDF). p. 98. Retrieved February 17, 2023. TS FISA briefed to HPSCI tomorrow. Any concerns this will leak? [...] Yes [I'm talking about Carter Page], and it will create a real monster for us if it is made public as CP will out our engagement in a NY minute....
  50. 1 2 Weiser, Benjamin; Rashbaum, William K. (January 23, 2023). "Former Top F.B.I. Official in New York Charged in Money Laundering". The New York Times. Retrieved January 23, 2023.
  51. ↑ Schwartz, Mattathias. "Exclusive: Inside the extramarital affair and cash-fueled double life of Charles McGonigal, the FBI spy hunter charged with taking Russian money". Business Insider. Retrieved February 13, 2023.
  52. ↑ Lisa Fickenscher (January 26, 2023). "Ex-FBI official Charles McGonigal worked for more than one Russian billionaire". New York Post . Retrieved March 2, 2023. An Aman spokesperson confirmed the company hired McGonigal last year, but maintained that his tenure began just a few months ago. "Mr. McGonigal was hired by Aman Group in the fall of 2022 as global head of security, based on his qualifications and similar role in the real estate industry, as well as his two decades with the Federal Bureau of Investigation," the Aman rep said. The company also said McGonigal is no longer working for Aman Group, but it did not disclose when he left.
  53. ↑ Schwartz, Mattathias. "Exclusive: The FBI's McGonigal labyrinth". Business Insider. Retrieved March 1, 2023.
  54. ↑ Office of Public Affairs. U.S. Department of Justice. (14 December 2023). "Press release: Former Special Agent in Charge of the New York FBI Counterintelligence Division Sentenced to 50 Months for Conspiring to Violate U.S. Sanctions on Russia". Department of Justice website Retrieved 17 December 2023.
  55. ↑ Dienst, Jonathan; Winter, Tom (January 23, 2023). "Ex-FBI official arrested for alleged money laundering, Russia sanctions, taking money from former foreign agent". NBC News. Retrieved January 23, 2023.
  56. ↑ Schwartz, Mattathias (February 16, 2023). "Exclusive: British intel caught FBI spy chief secretly meeting a Russian in London". Insider . Retrieved March 2, 2023. In 2018, Charles McGonigal, the FBI's former New York spy chief, traveled to London where he met with a Russian contact who was under surveillance by British authorities, two US intelligence sources told Insider. The British were alarmed enough by the meeting to alert the FBI's legal attaché, who was stationed at the US Embassy. The FBI then used the surreptitious meeting as part of their basis to open an investigation into McGonigal, one of the two sources said.
  57. ↑ "Former Special Agent in Charge of the New York FBI Counterintelligence Division Pleads Guilty to Conspiring to Violate U.S. Sanctions on Russia". August 15, 2023. Retrieved August 15, 2023.
  58. ↑ Schwartz, Mattathias; Cohen, Rebecca (August 15, 2023). "Disgraced former FBI agent Charles McGonigal pleads guilty to working with a sanctioned Russian oligarch". Business Insider.
  59. ↑ Katersky, Aaron (December 14, 2023). "Ex-FBI counterintelligence chief Charles McGonigal sentenced to 50 months in prison for working with Russian oligarch". ABC News .
  60. ↑ Schwartz, Matthathias (January 27, 2023). "Exclusive: Inside the extramarital affair and cash-fueled double life of Charles McGonigal, the FBI spy hunter charged with taking Russian money".
  61. ↑ Guerriero, Allison [@AllisonGuerrier] (May 5, 2023). "[Charles McGonigal] was my boyfriend from Spring 2017 - December 2018 and in retrospect, after rolling all of it over in my head, I wouldn't rule your theory out. He told me he was divorced and he wasn't plus he was taking bribes and meeting with Deripaska while we dated but he never told me that" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  62. 1 2 "Exclusive: Inside the extramarital affair and cash-fueled double life of Charles McGonigal, the FBI spy hunter charged with taking Russian money". Business Insider.
  63. ↑ "Rama and Haradinaj, on the wall of former FBI agent Charles McGonigal's office". February 20, 2023.
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