President Trump revoked U.S. Secret Service protection for John R. Bolton within hours of taking office, stripping his former national security adviser of the security detail he had been granted because of threats on his life from Iran, Mr. Bolton said on Tuesday.
Mr. Bolton said he received a call from a Secret Service official on Monday evening, less than 12 hours after Mr. Trump was sworn in as president for his second term, telling him that the president wanted to end his security.
“I am disappointed but not surprised that President Trump has made this decision,” Mr. Bolton said in a statement to The New York Times. “Notwithstanding my criticisms of President Biden’s national security policies, he nonetheless made the decision to once again extend Secret Service protection to me in 2021.”
“The Justice Department filed criminal charges against an Iranian Revolutionary Guard official in 2022 for attempting to hire a hit man to target me,” he said.
“That threat remains today, as also demonstrated by the recent arrest of someone trying to arrange for President Trump’s own assassination,” Mr. Bolton said. “The American people can judge for themselves which president made the right call.”
A spokesman for the Secret Service said the agency did not comment on or confirm information about its protective efforts. A White House spokesman did not respond to an email seeking comment.
But Mr. Trump himself acknowledged ending the Secret Service protection to reporters at the White House on Tuesday.
“We’re not going to have security on people for the rest of their lives. Why should we?” said Mr. Trump, who as a president is guaranteed some form of protection for the rest of his life.
Mr. Trump ousted Mr. Bolton in 2019 after they had a falling-out. Mr. Bolton then wrote a book detailing his time working for Mr. Trump that enraged the president, whose administration tried to stop its publication.
Mr. Bolton was the target of a murder plot by Shahram Poursafi, a member of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, in 2022, according to the Justice Department. Officials at the Justice Department said they suspected that the alleged plot was payback for the military strike that Mr. Trump ordered against Qassim Suleimani, a top Iranian general, in January 2020.
Mr. Bolton and Mr. Trump’s last national security adviser in the first administration, Robert C. O’Brien, were granted Secret Service protection in 2021 by Mr. Biden. Both have been deeply critical of Mr. Biden’s foreign policy decisions, although Mr. O’Brien has remained a defender of Mr. Trump. Mr. O’Brien’s security detail was pulled by the Biden administration in 2024.
Other Trump officials, including the president, have faced ongoing threats from Iran since the strike that killed General Suleimani. Mr. Biden’s administration increased protection for Mike Pompeo, Mr. Trump’s final secretary of state in his first term, and one of his top aides, Brian H. Hook, in late 2023 amid ongoing threats from Iran.
Mr. Trump has criticized Mr. Pompeo privately and Mr. Hook publicly. It was also unclear whether they still had protection now that Mr. Trump was back in office.
Mr. Trump’s security increased last July, shortly before he was the target of an assassination attempt at an outdoor rally in Butler, Pa., because of an increased threat from Iran. The assassination attempt, which wounded Mr. Trump’s right ear, was unrelated to Iran.
Nonetheless, the threat from Iran against Mr. Trump continued throughout much of 2024, according to several people briefed on the matter.
