Ex-Fort Bragg worker Courtney Williams charged with leaking Delta Force secrets to journalist
by The Washington Times AI News Desk · The Washington TimesA former Defense Department employee with top-secret clearance was charged Wednesday with transmitting classified military information to a journalist — an arrest that the journalist says is federal retaliation against a whistleblower who exposed sexual harassment inside one of the Army’s most secretive units.
Courtney P. Williams, 40, who supported a Special Military Unit at Fort Bragg in North Carolina, was arrested by the FBI on Tuesday and charged with unlawfully transmitting national defense information, including classified tactics used in sensitive missions, to an investigative reporter over a period spanning several years, federal prosecutors allege.
Ms. Williams first joined the unit as a defense contractor in April 2010 and became a Department of Defense employee that November, according to court records. She worked in a support role for the Special Operations unit Delta Force at Fort Bragg until 2016. She held a Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmented Information (TS/SCI) clearance and had direct access to highly sensitive operational details, including tactics, techniques and procedures, commonly known as TTPs, used by elite military units.
Ms. Williams signed a Classified Information Nondisclosure Agreement when she was hired and again in September 2015, when her access was suspended and she was debriefed, according to the complaint. She faces up to 10 years in prison.
Court documents allege that Ms. Williams communicated with a journalist from 2022 to 2025, during which they had over 10 hours of phone calls and exchanged more than 180 messages.
Ms. Williams was featured prominently in a Politico Magazine article by Seth Harp published last August that detailed alleged misconduct in Delta Force. The article was adapted from Mr. Harp’s book, “The Fort Bragg Cartel,” which was published the same month and examined unsolved murders and other problems at the military base.
On the day the article and book were published, Ms. Williams texted the journalist expressing concern.
“Other than a few factual errors, I would definitely have been concerned with the amount of classified information being disclosed,” she wrote, according to an FBI affidavit attached to the complaint. “I thought things I was telling you so you could have a better general understanding of how the (SMU) was set up or operated would not be published.”
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The complaint also indicates Ms. Williams expressed worry to her mother, saying, “I might actually get arrested, and I don’t even get a free copy of the book.” When her mother asked why, Ms. Williams said it was “for disclosing classified information.”
FBI Special Agent in Charge Reid Davis said the tradecraft, tactics and techniques used by the military unit “are classified and should be shared only with those with proper clearances and a need to know in order to protect American lives.”
FBI Director Kash Patel posted to X following the arrest, warning others against leaking.
“Let this serve as a message to any would-be leakers: We’re working these cases, and we’re making arrests,” Mr. Patel wrote. “This FBI will not tolerate those who seek to betray our country and put Americans in harm’s way.”
Mr. Harp strongly disputed the government’s framing. He called Ms. Williams a “courageous whistleblower” who helped expose “rampant gender discrimination and sexual harassment” in Delta Force, and accused the Justice Department of prosecuting her in retaliation for her critical comments about the unit. He added that officials had not detailed what specific classified national defense information she had leaked.
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Ms. Williams was ordered held pending a hearing early next week, according to court records.
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