# Dan Bongino

Daniel John Bongino (born December 4, 1974) is an American government official, conservative political commentator, radio host, and former law enforcement officer who has served as the 20th deputy director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) since 2025. He hosted The Dan Bongino Show on Rumble and previously hosted Unfiltered with Dan Bongino on Fox News until April 2023.
Bongino began his career as a New York City Police Department (NYPD) officer from 1995 to 1999 before serving as a U.S. Secret Service agent from 1999 to 2011. He later unsuccessfully ran for Congress three times as a Republican. On February 23, 2025, President Donald Trump announced that Bongino had been named the next deputy director of the FBI. He assumed office on March 17, after concluding his commentating roles on March 14.

## Early life and education

Bongino was born and raised in Queens, New York City. He is of Italian descent.
He graduated from Archbishop Molloy High School, a Catholic all-male high school in Jamaica, Queens, in 1992. He attended Queens College, earning bachelor's and master's degrees in psychology. He also earned a Master of Business Administration degree from Pennsylvania State University.

## Secret Service and law enforcement career (1995–2011)

Bongino worked as a police officer for the New York City Police Department from 1995 to 1999.
Bongino joined the United States Secret Service in 1999 as a special agent. In 2002 he left the New York Field Office to become an instructor at the Secret Service Training Academy in Beltsville, Maryland. In 2006, he was assigned to the Presidential Protection Division during George W. Bush's second term. He remained on protective duty after Barack Obama became president, leaving in May 2011 to run for the U.S. Senate.
Also in 2011, The Baltimore Sun reported that Bongino was the lead investigator of a car rental fraud scheme. His work contributed to two people being indicted on federal wire fraud charges.
Bongino was criticized by former colleagues at the Secret Service for using his Secret Service background as part of his run for political office and for his claim of having secret information based on conversations he overheard in the Obama White House. A former colleague criticized him for trying to use his proximity to President Barack Obama in his political career: "He's trying to draw attention to himself and he's hijacking the Secret Service brand. That's all he's got going for him." Bongino said he had access to "high-level discussions" in the White House.
He rejected birtherism, the claim that President Obama was born outside the United States.

## Media career

Bongino has been a radio host and commentator on both local and national programs. He has guest-hosted The Sean Hannity Show and The Mark Levin Show and has filled in on WMAL-FM in Washington, D.C., and WBAL in Baltimore. He was a paid contributor to NRATV until December 2018. He also guest-hosted Hannity on Fox News in December 2018.
In December 2019, Bongino launched the Bongino Report as an alternative to the Drudge Report, criticizing its founder, Matt Drudge, for allegedly shifting away from supporting Donald Trump.
In October 2020 Politico reported that Bongino's posts on Facebook were routinely among the most shared on the platform.
Following the January 6 United States Capitol attack, Bongino's Twitter account was temporarily suspended on January 7 for violating the platform's Civic Integrity policy. On his podcast, he argued that political violence had been normalized by leftist movements and accused liberal media outlets of hypocrisy in their coverage of protests.
In March 2021, Cumulus Media signed Bongino to replace The Rush Limbaugh Show on its talk radio stations while continuing to carry his one-hour podcast. In May of that year, Fox News announced he would host Unfiltered with Dan Bongino, which premiered on June 5. Between July and August 2021, he hosted Canceled in the USA, a five-part Fox Nation series on cancel culture. Talkers Magazine estimated his radio show had 8.5 million listeners as of October 2021, ranking second among programs competing to succeed Limbaugh.
In January 2022, YouTube permanently banned Bongino for attempting to circumvent a temporary suspension related to a video questioning the efficacy of masks during the COVID-19 pandemic. Prior to the ban, he had already moved his podcast to Rumble.
On December 11, 2022, Bongino announced plans to end his Cumulus radio show at the conclusion of his contract. Cumulus began phasing his show out of its stations' lineups in June 2023. However, in December 2023, he reversed course, securing a multi-year contract extension with Westwood One.
On April 20, 2023, Bongino announced his departure from Fox News, citing failed contract negotiations.

### Conflict over COVID-19 vaccine mandates

On October 19, 2021, Bongino said that he opposed corporate vaccine mandates, although he said he was vaccinated. He called on his employer, Cumulus Media, to end their vaccine mandate, which had been announced in September. Unvaccinated employees at Cumulus had already been let go on October 11 and replaced.
"You can have me or the mandate. But you can't have both of us", Bongino said on his show. After taking nearly two weeks off, he returned to announce he was negotiating his ultimatum with Cumulus, and starting a fund for former employees of Cumulus fired because of the vaccination mandate.
Brian Rosenwald, a talk radio historian, believed Bongino's request was never much of an ultimatum, seeing little reason for Cumulus or its host to sever ties. Rosenwald commented:
   I think it was a cynical ploy, to some extent. There was an incentive for him to stay with them because of that platform, and they've invested a lot of money in launching this show and building it up.
In a December 2021 interview with The New Yorker, Bongino stated that he had been vaccinated for COVID-19, at the advice of his doctor due to his lymphoma.

## Political aspirations
### 2012 U.S. Senate election

Bongino ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate in Maryland in 2012. Former gubernatorial candidate Brian Murphy was his campaign chairman. Bongino won the Republican primary on April 3, 2012, with 33.8 percent of the vote, defeating nine other candidates. He lost the general election in a landslide, taking only 26.6% of the vote against incumbent Democrat Ben Cardin in a three way election battle.

### 2014 House of Representatives election

Bongino ran for the U.S. House of Representatives seat from Maryland's 6th Congressional District in the 2014 election against incumbent Democrat John Delaney. Bongino narrowly lost to Delaney by 1.5 percentage points. Bongino carried four of the district's five counties, but had a 20,500-vote deficit in the district's share of Montgomery County in the outer suburbs of Washington.

### 2016 House of Representatives election

After moving to Florida in 2015, Bongino contemplated running for the United States Senate and Florida's 18th congressional district in 2016. However, in June 2016, Bongino declared that he would seek the Republican nomination for Florida's 19th congressional district. He faced Chauncey Goss, a Sanibel city councilman who sought the seat in 2012, and Francis Rooney, a businessman and former United States ambassador to the Holy See, in the primary.
In an August 2016 interview with a Politico reporter, Bongino went on a profanity-laced rant against a reporter who asked about a story in the Naples Daily News that Bongino said was dishonest. The recorded phone call was published by Politico. He placed third in the August 2016 primary, losing the nomination to Rooney.

## Deputy Director of the FBI (2025–present)

On February 23, 2025, President Donald Trump announced on Truth Social that Bongino would be the next deputy director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Bongino took office on March 17. Unlike the FBI director, the position of deputy director does not require Senate confirmation.

## Political views and statements

In 2018, Bongino said, "My entire life right now is about owning the libs. That's it." He is a supporter of president Donald Trump.
According to Mother Jones, Bongino is a member of Groundswell, a group of conservative activists working to advance conservative causes.
Bongino has called the investigation of possible Trump-Russia collusion a "total scam", and is a proponent of the Spygate conspiracy theory. In May 2018, he was quoted by Trump in a tweet, as saying that former CIA Director John Brennan "has disgraced the entire Intelligence Community. He is the one man who is largely responsible for the destruction of American's faith in the Intelligence Community and in some people at the top of the FBI." Bongino was also quoted as alleging that Brennan was "worried about staying out of jail".
In May 2018, after Republican Congressman Trey Gowdy and some conservative legal experts challenged Trump's claims that the FBI had spied on his 2016 presidential campaign, Bongino claimed Gowdy had been "fooled" by the Department of Justice. In February 2019, he accused Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein of attempting a coup against Trump.
Bongino reportedly told the House Judiciary Committee during hearings on police brutality that efforts to reduce the funding of police departments were an "abomination" that should be dropped "before someone gets hurt".
After Joe Biden won the 2020 election and Trump refused to concede, Bongino backed his false claims of election fraud, and claimed that Democrats had rigged the election. He was listed among the top five "superspreaders of election misinformation" by the global activist group Avaaz.
Bongino was a strong critic of face mask mandates during the COVID-19 pandemic, stating that face masks are largely ineffective and deriding them as "face diapers" on occasion.

## Writing

Bongino has authored multiple books related to his career in law enforcement, politics, and support for Donald Trump.
His first book, Life Inside the Bubble, was published in 2013 and details his experiences as a Secret Service agent, including his work protecting Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, investigating federal crimes, and running for the U.S. Senate. In 2016, he released The Fight: A Secret Service Agent's Inside Account of Security Failings and the Political Machine, which focuses on security issues and political corruption.
In 2019, Bongino published Spygate: The Attempted Sabotage of Donald J. Trump, which promotes the Spygate conspiracy theory, alleging improper surveillance of Donald Trump's 2016 campaign. Later that year, he released Exonerated: The Failed Takedown of President Donald Trump by the Swamp, which was listed on The New York Times Best Seller list with a dagger symbol, indicating bulk sales influenced its ranking. In August 2020, Bongino denied that bulk purchases had contributed to the book's placement, stating that the only bulk sales event took place a month after it appeared on the list.

## Personal life

Bongino is married to Paula Andrea, née Martinez, who was born in Colombia. They have two daughters. In 2012, he and his wife operated three home-based businesses, selling martial arts apparel, designing websites, and consulting on security and risk management. While running for office in 2016, Bongino resisted talking about his business interests and said he and his wife had shut them down.
Bongino lived in Severna Park, Maryland from 2002 until 2015, when he relocated to Palm City, Florida.
Bongino announced in June 2020 that he had purchased an "ownership stake" of unspecified value in Parler, an alternative social media platform.

### Cancer diagnosis

On September 23, 2020, Bongino announced that a seven-centimeter tumor had been found in his throat. He added that he was unsure if the tumor was cancerous or benign, but would fly to New York on September 25 for further screening. On October 2, he said that he had received a "bad phone call" from doctors, and announced that he would be undergoing surgery on October 7.
Following his surgery, he tweeted that the "entire tumor" was removed from his neck, but that he likely had lymphoma. He said he would receive treatment in the future. On October 16, he confirmed that he received an official diagnosis of Hodgkin lymphoma, adding that he would be continuing treatment in consultation with his doctors. In an interview in July 2021, Bongino said that he had "beaten" cancer.

## Electoral history

2016 Florida's 19th Congressional District Republican Primary :
| Party | Party | Candidate | Votes | % |
| | Republican | Francis Rooney | 46,800 | 52.73 |
| | Republican | Chauncey Goss | 26,520 | 29.88 |
| | Republican | Dan Bongino | 15,434 | 17.39 |
| Total votes | Total votes | Total votes | 88,754 | 100.00 |
2014 Maryland's 6th Congressional District General Election :
| Party | Party | Candidate | Votes | % |
| | Democratic | John Delaney (incumbent) | 94,704 | 49.7 |
| | Republican | Dan Bongino | 91,930 | 48.2 |
| | Green | George Gluck | 3,762 | 2.0 |
| Total votes | Total votes | Total votes | 190,536 | 100.00 |
2014 Maryland's 6th Congressional District Republican Primary :
| Party | Party | Candidate | Votes | % |
| | Republican | Dan Bongino | 23,933 | 83.5 |
| | Republican | Harold W. Painter Jr. | 4,718 | 16.5 |
| Total votes | Total votes | Total votes | 28,651 | 100 |
United States Senate election in Maryland, 2012 :
| Party | Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% |
| | Democratic | Ben Cardin (incumbent) | 1,402,092 | 55.41 | +1.20 |
| | Republican | Dan Bongino | 674,649 | 26.66 | −17.53 |
| | Independent | Rob Sobhani | 420,554 | 16.62 | N/A |
| | Libertarian | Dean Ahmad | 30,672 | 1.21 | +1.21 |
| | N/A | Others (write-in) | 2,583 | 0.10 | +0.05 |
| Majority | Majority | Majority | 727,443 | 100.00 | |
| Turnout | Turnout | Turnout | 2,530,550 | 68.23 | |
| | Democratic hold | Democratic hold | Swing | | |
United States Senate Election in Maryland, 2012 Republican Primary :
| Party | Party | Candidate | Votes | % |
| | Republican | Dan Bongino | 66,561 | 33.8 |
| | Republican | Richard J. Douglas | 55,907 | 28.4 |
| | Republican | Joseph Alexander | 17,567 | 8.9 |
| | Republican | Bro Broadus | 10,503 | 5.3 |
| | Republican | Rick Hoover | 10,241 | 5.2 |
| | Republican | John B. Kimble | 10,088 | 5.1 |
| | Republican | David Jones | 8,002 | 4.1 |
| | Republican | Corrogan R. Vaughn | 7,869 | 4.0 |
| | Republican | William Thomas Capps Jr. | 6,768 | 3.4 |
| | Republican | Brian Vaeth | 3,602 | 1.8 |
| Total votes | Total votes | Total votes | 204,268 | 100 |

## Publications

* Bongino, Dan (November 19, 2013). Life Inside the Bubble: Why a Top-Ranked Secret Service Agent Walked Away from It All. WND Books. ISBN 978-1-938067-36-5. OCLC 858126450.
* Bongino, Dan (January 12, 2016). The Fight: A Secret Service Agent's Inside Account of Security Failings and the Political Machine. St. Martin's Press. ISBN 978-1-250-08298-5. OCLC 924683173.
* Bongino, Dan (October 6, 2020). Follow the Money: The Shocking Deep State Connections of the Anti-Trump Cabal. New York: Post Hill Press. ISBN 9781642936599.
* Bongino, Dan (September 12, 2023). The Gift of Failure (And I'll rethink the title if this book fails!). New York: Post Hill Press (Liberatio Protocol). ISBN 9798888450635.