An academic and author who was involved with the Trump campaign said he was interrogated by FBI agents at Logan International Airport Tuesday and issued a subpoena to testify in front of a grand jury as part of special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into Russia’s involvement in the 2016 election.
The agents questioned Ted Malloch about topics including his involvement with the campaign, former Trump advisor Roger Stone, and WikiLeaks, Malloch said in a statement provided to the Globe by representatives of Skyhorse Publishing, the publisher of Malloch’s forthcoming book.
The Special Counsel’s Office and the FBI declined to comment, according to spokesmen for the agencies.
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Malloch said that he and his wife, after getting off a flight from London, were escorted by a TSA official and an FBI agent to a separate area, where Malloch’s suitcase was searched. He said he was brought to a conference room in another building, where two FBI agents told him he was being detained to answer questions as part of the Special Counsel’s investigation.
“They seemed to know everything about me and had my color photograph and personal details and said in intimidating ways, that it was a felony to lie to the FBI,” Malloch said. “I stated that I realized that, and I would readily, in fact gladly, cooperate with them.”
Malloch said the agents quizzed him about topics ranging from “top-secret code word government clearances in an earlier era” to his being a fan of the Philadelphia Eagles, then zeroed in on matters related to the Trump campaign and the Russian investigation.
“The questions got more detailed about my involvement in the Trump campaign (which was informal and unpaid); whom I communicated with; whom I knew and how well — they had a long list of names,” he said.
The agents, according to Malloch, asked him whether he had been to the Ecuadorian embassy in London, where WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has lived in asylum since 2012. Malloch said he told the agents he had never been to that embassy.
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Malloch said the agents handed him a subpoena, which had been issued Tuesday in Boston, ordering him to appear Friday before the Special Counsel’s grand jury in Washington, D.C. He said he contacted the Special Counsel’s Office Wednesday and his appearance was rescheduled for April 13.
Malloch was rumored last year to be a candidate to serve as US ambassador to the European Union, according to The Guardian, which first published Malloch’s account of the encounter at Logan.
Malloch graduated in 1974 from Gordon College, an evangelical Christian college in Wenham, and taught in the school’s Political Studies Department from 1979 to 1983, according to The Tartan, Gordon’s student newspaper.
In his statement, Malloch speculated that the FBI wanted to speak with him because they had read his upcoming book, “The Plot to Destroy Trump: How the Deep State Fabricated the Russian Dossier to Subvert the President.”
“What could they want from me — a policy wonk and philosophical defender of Trump?” Malloch said. “I am not an operative, have no Russia contacts, and — aside from appearing on air and in print often to defend and congratulate our President — have done nothing wrong. What message does this send?”
Jacob Carozza can be reached at jacob.carozza@globe.com.
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