The FBI obtained phone records belonging to Kash Patel and Susie Wiles when both were private citizens during investigations tied to President Donald Trump ahead of the 2024 election, according to officials familiar with the matter.

An FBI spokesman, Ben Williamson, appeared to confirm the existence of the subpoenas in a post on X, publicly acknowledging the activity after the disclosures surfaced.

Reuters reported that the records were collected in 2022 and 2023 as part of then-special counsel Jack Smith’s investigations into Trump’s handling of classified documents and challenges to the 2020 election results. The subpoenas sought so-called toll records, which show the timing and recipients of calls but not the content of conversations. Such records can be obtained by subpoena without a judge’s approval and do not constitute wiretaps.

Patel disclosed the seizure in a statement on Wednesday and ordered the ouster of at least 10 FBI employees involved in the Mar-a-Lago classified documents investigation, according to multiple people briefed on the matter.

The removals are part of a monthslong review of holdover personnel who worked directly on matters related to investigations of Trump and his allies. In August, former acting FBI Director Brian Driscoll was fired, alongside top FBI officials Steven Jensen and Spencer Evans, over their participation in Biden-era Trump investigations. According to MS NOW, a similar purge happened last month involving as many as six agents in Miami, who had previously worked on the classified documents criminal case against Trump.

“It is outrageous and deeply alarming that the previous FBI leadership secretly subpoenaed my own phone records – along with those of now White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles – using flimsy pretexts and burying the entire process in prohibited case files designed to evade all oversight,” Patel said.

Patel also briefed Wiles on the matter on Wednesday, according to a source familiar with the discussion.

The full scope of and justification behind the collection of the phone data, including whether Patel or Wiles were themselves investigative subjects, is unclear. Both were close advisers to Trump during the period examined by Smith and were interviewed by investigators. Patel himself testified before a grand jury in 2022, and he served as Trump’s designated representative to the National Archives and Records Administration at the time that agency sought to collect Trump’s retained records. But Wiles was not part of Trump’s first administration and had no obvious involvement in either the 2020 election challenges or the storage of Trump’s presidential records, raising questions about why she would be a target for surveillance in those investigations.

The Justice Department’s investigations into Trump during former Attorney General Merrick Garland‘s tenure examined both his retention of classified documents and alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

Smith ultimately charged Trump in 2023, but after Trump’s reelection, Smith dropped both the election case and the classified documents case, citing long-standing DOJ policy against prosecuting a sitting president. The classified documents case was previously dismissed by a Florida judge in July 2024, finding Smith was unlawfully appointed as special counsel.

Republicans in Congress have framed the FBI’s spying on Trump allies and other sitting GOP lawmakers as part of a broader pattern tied to the FBI’s 2022 “Arctic Frost” investigation, which later formed the basis of Smith’s election-related case. The FBI also conducted some surveillance on Trump’s 2016 campaign over unfounded allegations that it was colluding with Russia to steal the election.

Through the help of whistleblowers, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) revealed in October that there were at least 197 subpoenas issued by Smith that sought records related to at least 340 named Republican individuals or entities, and that he further sought phone toll records for at least 20 current or former Republican members of Congress.

Grassley called the revelations of the Wiles and Patel subpoenas “terrible.”

“Last year I was the first to sound the alarm on the existence of ‘Prohibited Access’ files at FBI I warned FBI used this system to hide key info SURE ENOUGH we’ve learned that Biden FBI was scooping records on Kash Patel+Susie Wiles & hiding the evidence as ‘prohibited’ docs,” Grassley posted to X.

Grassley has continued oversight into the origins and scope of the politicized Trump-related investigations, and he recently mapped out a timeline of that investigation dating back to 2022, arguing that hundreds of Republicans, including lawmakers and affiliated organizations, were swept into its investigative dragnet through subpoenas and records requests.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment from the Washington Examiner.