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FBI Director Kash Patel said Wednesday that Courtney Williams, 40, a former employee at Fort Bragg who previously held top security clearance, has been charged with transmitting classified national defense information.
“FBI and our partners have arrested a former [Special Operations Command] employee, who supported our top-level military warfighters, for allegedly transmitting classified information to a member of the media. Outstanding work by [FBI Charlotte] and the FBI Counterintelligence & Espionage Division, as well as our [Justice Department] partners,” Patel said.“Let this serve as a message to any would-be leakers: we’re working these cases, and we’re making arrests. This FBI will not tolerate those who seek to betray our country and put Americans in harm’s way,” he added.
In a subsequent post, Patel suggested that more arrests over leaks were “coming.” The arrest follows statements by President Donald Trump threatening jail time for reporters who decline to identify sources in connection with a leak about a downed American aircraft.
Williams held top security clearance from 2010 to 2016. Authorities say that from 2022 to 2025, she communicated with an investigative journalist through more than 10 hours of phone calls and 180 text messages. She allegedly shared “tactics, techniques and procedures” related to a special operations force.
While not named in court documents, the journalist appears to be Seth Harp, the author of “The Fort Bragg Cartel: Drug Trafficking and Murder in the Special Forces.” An excerpt from the book appeared in POLITICO under the headline, “My Life Became a Living Hell’: One Woman’s Career in Delta Force, the Army’s Most Elite Unit,” and focused on Williams’ experience in Delta Force.
In a post on X, Harp claimed that Williams had done nothing criminal.
“Trump’s unhinged DOJ will not even say what ‘classified information’ she allegedly leaked,” he said. “Her arrest and imprisonment is an outrage.”
Harp told WRAL-TV that “the government is going after Courtney for the sole reason that she exposed sexual harassment and gender discrimination in the unit,” adding, “This is a vindictive act of retaliation.”
Text messages cited in court documents suggest Williams was aware of potential legal risk following the publication of Harp’s book. In one message, she allegedly expressed concern about “the amount of classified information being disclosed,” and in a separate message wrote, “I might actually get arrested . . . for disclosing classified information.”Another message attributed to Williams said that she knew she was “probably going to jail for life.”
Court documents show that Williams will be appointed counsel from the Eastern District of North Carolina Federal Public Defender’s Office. An attorney has not yet been publicly identified.
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