Austin Man Pleads Guilty to Making Violent Threats Against FBI Director and Employees

AUSTIN, Texas - An Austin man pleaded guilty in federal court this week to one count of interstate communications with threat to injure or kidnap, announced U.S. Attorney Justin R. Simmons for the Western District of Texas.

According to court documents, June 7, Michael James Argo, 46, used the social media platform X to make several public threats to injure and murder FBI Director Kash Patel and FBI employees. An FBI agent contacted Argo about the threats on July 30. Despite being aware of the investigation into his June threats, Argo again used his X account between Sept. 13 and Sept. 18 to make additional public threats to injure, murder and kidnap Patel.

A criminal complaint filed on Sept. 20 includes multiple threatening posts from Argo's X profile. One post threatens to "kidnap and gender reassign" Patel. Other posts include photos in which Argo was brandishing a firearm. He also threatened the agent who had initially contacted him regarding the investigation based on his threats in June.

Argo faces up to five years in federal prison, three years of supervised release and a maximum fine of $250,000. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.

The FBI is investigating the case.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Britni Verdeja is prosecuting the case.

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