Inset left: President Donald Trump speaks during a Religious Liberty Commission hearing at the Museum of the Bible on Monday, Sept. 8, 2025, in Washington (AP Photo/Alex Brandon). Inset right: Kash Patel (FBI). Background: FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C. (Google Maps).
A former FBI special agent trainee who says he was “singled out” and dismissed in October after displaying a Pride flag at his desk in a Los Angeles office is asking a federal judge to move his lawsuit against FBI Director Kash Patel into discovery as soon as the court allows.
David Maltinsky, who is gay, filed the lawsuit in November, alleging Patel brought an abrupt end to his 16-year FBI career as a staff operations specialist and intelligence support employee, derailing what Maltinsky described as his “childhood dream” of becoming a special agent. According to the complaint, he was terminated because he “displayed a Progress Pride flag at his workstation” — a flag the FBI itself had flown and one he says he kept at his desk with the permission and approval of supervisors.
While Patel is seeking to defend his public reputation through defamation lawsuits he has filed, the FBI director is also confronting several complaints accusing him of wrongful terminations and of “weaponiz[ing] government for political reasons.”
Patel is alleged to have played a leading role in Donald Trump’s campaign of retaliation against FBI agents involved in criminal investigations of the president, as well as employees accused of “unprofessional conduct and a lack of impartiality in carrying out duties[.]”
In Maltinsky’s case, the stated reason for ending his “probationary employment” with just three weeks of training remaining was “poor judgment with an inappropriate display of political signage in your work area during your previous assignment at the Los Angeles Field Office.”
Maltinsky is now fighting Patel’s partial motion to dismiss, while pressing to dig further into what his lawyers call the facts behind “Defendants’ egregious actions.”
“Defendants’ shocking abuse of an honorable member of the federal law enforcement community cries out for justice,” a filing submitted Wednesday said, while previewing a separate discovery motion. “Defendants do not contest that Maltinsky adequately pleaded First Amendment and Appointments Clause claims—meaning this case must proceed to discovery.”
On the discovery front, the plaintiff is asking Senior U.S. District Judge Richard Leon to swiftly put the Trump administration on the spot again. Maltinsky’s lawyers with the Washington Litigation Group called the case a “textbook example in which waiting makes little practical sense.”
“[O]ne way or another, to resolve the First Amendment claims at minimum, this case must head to discovery. Because there is no need to wait for discovery to begin, Maltinsky respectfully requests the Court schedule a Rule 16 conference at its earliest convenience,” the motion said. “Defendants have indicated they oppose this motion.”
The post ‘There is no need to wait’: Fired FBI employee asks judge to turn up heat on Kash Patel in discovery at the court’s ‘earliest convenience’ first appeared on Law & Crime.
