FBI agents confronted former Rep. Eric Swalwell at San Francisco International Airport and seized his electronics under a search warrant.
Agents served Swalwell, 45, with the warrant Saturday after he arrived in California and took his cellphone and other electronics report that broke the story. Sources told the outlet agents also executed additional warrants at Swalwell’s Washington, DC, home Sunday, where they seized other potential evidence. The former congressman was reportedly cooperative during the airport encounter.
The FBI action marks an escalation in the federal criminal probe into sexual misconduct allegations that have already ended Swalwell’s political career. The former congressman resigned from Congress in April after at least four women publicly accused him of sexual assault and misconduct, including a former staffer who alleged he raped her twice when she was too intoxicated to consent.
Swalwell’s lawyer, Sara Azari, has pushed back against what she characterized as politically motivated investigations. “What is new and deeply concerning is the apparent use of federal law enforcement information to punish an outspoken critic of the current administration,” she told the San Francisco Chronicle in a statement Monday regarding newly declassified FBI files about a separate Chinese spy probe. “An investigation that produced no charges and no finding of wrongdoing should not be resurrected years later as a vehicle for political retaliation.”
The declassified documents Azari referenced revealed Swalwell told FBI investigators in 2015 that he had “physical relations with Fang on a handful of occasions, but never dated her or had a romantic relationship” with Christine Fang, a suspected Chinese operative. That probe, which closed in 2017 without charges against Swalwell, has become entangled with the newer sexual misconduct investigation as both draw federal scrutiny.
FBI Director Kash Patel has taken a personal interest in Swalwell’s case. “@EricSwalwell has maintained that none of the allegations against him are true, and now that he’s resigned, we would welcome him to sit down with the FBI and share any information he has,” Patel wrote on X earlier this year. “We also encourage and welcome any person with relevant information to any of these matters to speak with us. Door is open to all.”
In the viral moment that precipitated his downfall, Swalwell faced a cascade of accusations beginning in early April 2026. The San Francisco Chronicle first reported that a former aide accused him of sexually assaulting her on two occasions when she was too intoxicated to consent, once in 2019 and again in 2024. CNN subsequently reported allegations from three additional women. Accuser Lonna Drewes held a press conference in Beverly Hills and claimed Swalwell drugged and raped her in 2018, telling reporters, “I did not consent to any sexual activity.” More than 50 former staffers called on him to resign in a public letter, writing, “We stand unequivocally with our colleague, who showed extraordinary courage in coming forward to share her truth. We believe her.” Swalwell ended his California gubernatorial campaign, then resigned from Congress effective immediately, though he denied the assault allegations as “flat false” while apologizing for unspecified “mistakes in judgment.”
The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office has also opened a criminal investigation into at least one alleged incident in New York City in April 2024. The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department is investigating Drewes’ accusations, with Sheriff Robert Luna telling ABC7 his Special Victims detectives would “thoroughly investigate all the allegations” and would “eventually interview the alleged suspect.”