CIA officer arrested with gold bars accused of making up top secret program, sources say

WASHINGTON — The CIA officer found with $40 million in gold bars stashed at his home is accused of creating a fake top secret intelligence program to receive government funds for his personal enrichment, according to two people with knowledge of the ongoing investigation.

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David Rush has been accused of exploiting the spy agency’s elaborate secrecy precautions that strictly limit sensitive information around such top secret programs to only those who “need to know,” these people said.

Rush is accused of creating a sham government contract as part of the program, the sources said, and inviting two of his CIA colleagues to participate in helping run it, they said. One of those colleagues transferred millions of dollars to the invented program, the people familiar with the investigation said.

Because Rush claimed the project was an ultrasecret “special access program,” his co-workers would have been prohibited from speaking about it with other employees, the people familiar with the investigation said. They did not know whether the other employees were aware of the alleged scheme or were unwitting accomplices.

The Washington Post first reported the allegations that Rush fabricated the program.

Rush was arrested last month and charged with one count of theft of public money, accused of filing false time sheets by saying he was a member of the Naval Reserve. Some of the accusations against him in court documents are far more serious. His lawyer had no comment Monday.

Rush has not yet entered a plea. On Friday, a judge ordered that he remain behind bars in Alexandria, Virginia, pending trial, siding with the prosecution’s argument that he posed a potential flight risk. He is no longer with the CIA.

The fictional program was supposed to involve contingency plans to keep the government operating in the event of a nuclear war or other dire emergency, one of the people said.

Rush is suspected of having a government defense contractor purchase large amounts of gold, based on the allegedly fraudulent contract, the person said.

There is no indication so far that Rush was acting on behalf of a foreign power, according to one of the people with knowledge of the case and three others who also had knowledge of the case.

The case has raised questions about how the CIA and other government departments vet employees and how the agency safeguards secrets.

NBC News has reported that several senior officials at the CIA have been placed on leave over the case.

Rush worked in the CIA’s Directorate of Science and Technology and was a liaison to the Defense Department for a sensitive nuclear submarine program. He was given the assignment at the request of Deputy Defense Secretary Steve Feinberg, with whom he had a close professional relationship over the years, NBC News has reported .

Feinberg, who has not been accused of wrongdoing, was a major donor to President Donald Trump’s campaigns and founded the private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management.

Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell has denied that Rush and Feinberg had “a close relationship of any kind.”

In a previous statement to NBC News, Parnell said Feinberg “never supported Mr. Rush’s career at any point in his life, nor did he endorse Mr. Rush for any career position.”

Rush is accused of making false claims about his education and his service in the military, according to court documents.

In government job applications, Rush falsely claimed that he graduated from Clemson University in 2000, that he had a graduate degree from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and that he was a Navy pilot, according to court documents filed by prosecutors. None of that was true, according to the court documents.

Rush was arrested after an FBI raid on his house on May 18 found 303 gold bars worth roughly $40 million, $2 million in cash and 35 luxury watches, according to a government affidavit.

Rush, who joined the CIA around 2009, is alleged to have made his first request for cash and gold bars from the government in November 2025, the affidavit says.

The current director of the CIA, John Ratcliffe, was sworn in on Jan. 23, 2025.