BREAKING: FBI Seized Eric Swalwell’s Electronics and Reportedly Executed Search Warrant at His Home

Federal law enforcement stopped former Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell in a California airport and seized his electronics before executing a search warrant on his Washington, D.C., home the next day, according to CNN.

The stunning developments come as it emerged that Swalwell, 45, admitted to the Federal Bureau of Investigation more than a decade ago that he had a sexual relationship with a suspected Chinese spy known as “Fang Fang.”

The FBI confronted Swalwell — who is facing probes from the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office in New York City and the Los Angeles Sheriff — at the San Francisco Airport on Saturday, and executed the search warrant on his home the following day, CNN’s Pamela Brown reported.

CNN Senior Law Enforcement Analyst and former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe called word of the FBI’s involvement a “huge development,” but told Brown, “it’s not perfectly clear to me why the FBI has stepped into an investigation of sexual misconduct at this point:”

Yeah, Pam, it’s a huge development and it’s I’m sure, a very concerning one for the former congressman and his family. You know, to be facing a DAs investigation in New York and, and a sheriff’s investigation in L.A. that’s pretty serious to begin with.

But now you have a third very big agency kind of behind that, the FBI and DOJ. I guess the curious thing to me is what they’re actually doing in this case.

We know because they executed search warrants over the weekend on him personally for his devices and then also at his residence.

We know they’ve been able to convince a federal judge that there is probable cause to believe that there is evidence of a crime, a federal crime on those devices, or in his residence. That’s the standard for getting those search warrants.

But we also know, as I’m sure my friend Elie [Honig] can tell you as well, this is not the sort of thing that the FBI typically investigates.

Claims of sexual misconduct, sexual assault, things like that are usually investigated by the jurisdiction in which that conduct took place at the state level or county level. So it’s not perfectly clear to me why the FBI has stepped into an investigation of sexual misconduct at this point.

The FBI’s apparent probe is the latest hit on Swalwell, who was once considered a frontrunner in the California governor’s race.

He suspended that campaign in April after a former staffer accused him of rape. Swalwell has denied the allegations and slammed them as false.

Swalwell also resigned from Congress as the multiple allegations of sexual misconduct emerged.

President Donald Trump declassified the 2015 documents detailing Swalwell’s FBI interviews about his relationship with Christine Fang, and the White House released them Monday.

Swalwell told agents he “had physical relations with Fang on a handful of occasions,” but that the two “never dated” and “never had a romantic relationship,” according to an FBI summary of the 2015 interview. The document said their last sexual encounter occurred in March 2015.

Swalwell described the relationship as “casual,” while telling investigators he believed Fang “may have wanted a more romantic relationship.”

This is a breaking story and has been updated.

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