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Prosecutors are expected to charge a man soon for allegedly threatening Katie Miller, the wife of top White House official Stephen Miller, despite FBI fears that no federal crime was committed, according to a report.
Justice Department prosecutors in Boston are being encouraged to bring charges even though there are internal concerns about the strength of the evidence, Bloomberg reported Monday.
The news comes after the resignation of FBI Deputy Director Andrew Bailey, who reportedly disagreed with how the bureau demoted two counterterrorism agents who pushed back on the probe into Miller’s caller.
The Justice Department is preparing to file an indictment or a criminal complaint potentially this week, people familiar with the matter told the publication. The specific charge hasn’t been decided upon. Yet prosecutors in the Massachusetts U.S. Attorney’s office, like some in the FBI, are wary about whether they have enough proof to secure a conviction, they added.
Former Justice Department officials familiar with the case told Bloomberg that the criteria for a federal threats case don’t appear to have been met. Instead, they said, the case was more of a matter for local police.
MAGA podcaster Katie Miller doesn’t think
The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Daily Beast, nor did the FBI. A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s office in Boston declined to comment to Bloomberg.
Last Friday, Michael Burgwald, the FBI’s Washington Field Office counterterrorism chief, and his deputy, Courtland Rae, were removed from their positions and transferred to FBI headquarters.
The decision came amid the Millers’ frustration that investigators were moving too slowly, Bloomberg Law reported.
“Senior leadership at the FBI determined they were stifling investigations into very serious threats and made a unilateral decision to remove them,” White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis told the outlet last week.
Miller is an architect of the Trump administration’s immigration policy. / Evelyn Hockstein / REUTERS
Burgwald and Rae led the FBI Washington field office’s counterterrorism division. They reportedly questioned the directive to look into Miller’s allegations.
“Harassing phone calls aren’t even in the ballpark of terrorism unless an actual terrorist is doing the dialing,” as one ex-FBI official briefed on the matter told MS NOW.
The FBI said the two agents were demoted by Washington bureau chief Darren Cox, not FBI Director Kash Patel, though MS NOW reported Patel was displeased with them regarding the Miller matter.
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“This was a personnel decision made at the Washington field office level alone based on our constant evaluation of mission needs. Any suggestion otherwise is false,” Cox said. “Director Patel did not order this decision.”
Katie Miller, 34, was an assistant press secretary in the Department of Homeland Security in the first Trump administration. She later joined then-Vice President Mike Pence’s communications staff. For the first half of 2025, she was the communications director for the so-called Department of Government Efficiency.
Miller is now a podcast host, and occasionally appears on Fox News. In May, she said on that network that a viral post by the Democrats’ official X account telling her husband to “shut up” was “violent.”