(Luis Cornelio, Headline USA) A domino effect of online comments turned a whistleblower’s claims about CIA document retrieval into viral rumors that the agency had raided Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard’s office. Her spokesperson, Olivia Coleman, is disputing the claims.
“This is false – the CIA did not raid the DNI’s office,” Coleman wrote Wednesday on X, in response to Fox News host Jesse Watters’s post discussing the rumored raid.
The speculation stemmed from comments made by CIA whistleblower James Erdman III during a Wednesday hearing before the Senate Homeland Security Committee, along with subsequent reactions from Rep. Anna Paulina Luna and social media users.
Eardman’s testimony largely pertained to the alleged cover-up of information about COVID-19’s origins. During the hearing, however, Erdman said that the CIA “took back 40 boxes of JFK files and MK ultra files being processed for declassification by DNI Gabbard.” The timeline around the alleged retrieval remains unclear.
(Video below. Relevant comments begin around the 8:08 mark.)
Luna, who chairs the House Oversight Task Force on the Declassification of Federal Secrets, responded by demanding the documents be returned to Gabbard’s office, though it was also unclear whether any files were permanently removed or later returned.
“Given the nature of docs in question, we are sending a preservation notice. Docs need to be returned to ODNI given that ODNI was given direction and authority by the President to declass RFK, MLK, & JFK,” Luna wrote on X, shortly after Eardman’s comments.
“Regarding MKULTRA, these were documents specifically requested by my Task Force and currently being used for our investigation,” she added.
Some social media users took Luna’s comments as a suggestion that the CIA was stonewalling a declassification process ordered by President Donald Trump.
Beyond Coleman’s denial, other officials disputed the raid characterization, including Ezra Cohen, who served on the Public Interest Declassification Board.
Cohen said via X that the files taken by the CIA were unrelated to the declassification process and that such files were ultimately returned to Gabbard after being scanned.
Luna has since said the issue is not with CIA Director John Ratcliffe or Gabbard, though some of her earlier posts threatened to hold the CIA in contempt if the files were not produced.
I am noticing a few large accounts stating falsely that I claimed there was a raid on Tulsi Gabbard’s office by the CIA. This is completely false. There is no clip or statement that exists. Why is there an orchestrated push for this narrative? Not one account can post a clip of… pic.twitter.com/jBM3fMhFmS
— Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (@RepLuna) May 14, 2026
This story may be updated if new information becomes available
