(Ken Silva, Headline USA) Jack Teixeira, the former Massachusetts Air National Guard member who caused an international uproar when he leaked highly classified documents about the war in Ukraine, is suing the U.S. government for transferring him to the supermax prison in Florence, Colorado—widely considered the harshest detention center in the U.S.
In a lawsuit filed in May, Teixeira paints his transfer as political retaliation. In May 2025, he gave ABC News an interview where he said he “would have done it again,” which the U.S. government construed to mean that he would commit the offense again in the future.
“But he would not, nor has he said he would. All he said is that, counterfactually, if he were to travel back in time, his knowledge today would not be material: he still would have felt justified in his (admittedly regrettable) actions,” his lawsuit says.
The lawsuit further says that Teixeira had been housed at Petersburg, a medium-security prison, before he gave his interview.
“Now, he is in solitary confinement at ADX Florence (conventionally, “Supermax”), where he is confined to his cell for at least 23 hours a day and is subjected to more restrictive conditions than some of history’s most infamous terrorists—even though Plaintiff has never even been accused of violence or of acting for a foreign power,” his lawsuit says.
The lawsuit further says that he barely even gets to speak to his family. His mother didn’t receive any letters from him from Dec. 23, 2025, to April 14, 2026—despite him writing many—and he sometimes goes months without getting to call her.
However, the Justice Department says such restrictions are necessary to make sure Teixeira doesn’t leak anymore classified info. In a motion to dismiss filed in August, the DOJ revealed that Air Force Secretary Troy E. Meink was involved in Teixeira’s transfer. Meink certified on June 3, 2025, that the information known to and disclosed by Teixeira includes national defense information classified at the TS/SCI or Secret levels, and that the disclosure of such information would be harmful to the national security.
A judge has to rule on the DOJ’s motion to dismiss.
Teixeira’s leaks in 2022, when he was just 21 years old, effectively debunked a longstanding Biden-administration narrative that the U.S.-backed Ukrainian resistance was decimating the Russian army on the battlefield. They included evidence that the Pentagon had soldiers on the ground in Ukraine when Biden administration officials said that there weren’t any, that the U.S. had spied on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and that the war in Ukraine was going worse than officials were saying publicly.
Rather than taking part in a sophisticated foreign intelligence operation or domestic whistleblowing, it turned out that Teixeira was simply trying to build clout with his fellow gamers. The Washington Post reported in April 2023 that Teixeira uploaded the Pentagon documents to a Discord chatroom using an anonymous account called “OG.”
NEW: Pentagon/Discord leaker Jack Teixeira has sued the DOJ for being transferred to Florence Supermax after he gave an unauthorized interview to ABC News.
The lawsuit reveals, among other things, that the Air Force Secretary was involved in Teixeira's transfer.
Attorney… https://t.co/YDprcykEhO pic.twitter.com/PjgTOKhF0p
— Ken Silva (@JD_Cashless) October 30, 2026
But at his sentencing, which is set to run through 2036, Teixeira stood by his actions.
In a 10-minute address, Teixeira said he was “exposing and correcting the lies that were perpetrated by President Biden and force-fed to the American people” about the war in Ukraine.
“I believe the Department of Justice was politicized against President Trump and myself,” added Teixeira, who said he acted alone. He called on Trump and members of his administration to reverse his convictions.
“If I saved one American, Russian or Ukrainian life in this money-grabbing war, my punishment was worth it,” he said.
Teixeira’s actions prompted enhanced government surveillance of Discord and other gaming platforms.
NBC News reported in April 2023 that the Biden White House was “looking at expanding the universe of online sites that intelligence agencies and law enforcement authorities track.”
“The intelligence community is now grappling with how it can scrub platforms like Discord in search of relevant material to avoid a similar leak in the future,” the outlet added, quoting an unnamed congressional official.
More information on the government’s targeting of gamers came out in February 2024, when the Government Accountability Office (GAO) reported that the FBI had increased its efforts to infiltrate gaming servers the year prior.
Ken Silva is the editor of Headline USA. Follow him at x.com/jd_cashless.
