Nancy Guthrie abduction: FBI analyzing DNA recovered from her home, sources say
In this May 4, 2015, file photo, Australian-born presenter, Savannah Guthrie poses alongside her mother Nancy Guthrie during a production break while hosting NBC’s ‘Today Show’ live from Australia at Sydney Opera House in Sydney. (Don Arnold/WireImage via Getty Images, FILE)
(TUCSON, Ariz.) — The FBI recently received and is now analyzing potentially critical DNA recovered from the Tucson, Arizona, home of Nancy Guthrie, sources familiar with the investigation told ABC News.
Nancy Guthrie, the 84-year-old mother of Today show host Savannah Guthrie, was abducted from her home early on Feb. 1.
A private Florida lab that works with the Pima County Sheriff’s Department sent the sample to the FBI in recent weeks, the sources said. The FBI is now using new technology to conduct advanced analysis on the DNA sample to see if it can lead to Nancy Guthrie’s kidnapper, according to the sources.
The Pima County Sheriff’s Department has previously described the DNA recovered from Nancy Guthrie’s home as a sample that came from more than one person.
Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos recently told a Neighborhood Watch group that it could take six more months to untangle the sample, separate the strands and isolate what investigators need.
The sheriff also said as many as five other labs around the country are working on the Guthrie case. It was not immediately clear which ones, what their roles are or whether there are additional DNA samples that are potentially relevant.
About two dozen Pima County and FBI investigators are still actively working the Guthrie case. After investigators released key evidence, like images from Nancy Guthrie’s doorbell camera, early on, seemingly little progress has been made on her whereabouts or the person or people who abducted her.
Last month, Savannah Guthrie spoke out in her first interview, telling her friend and former co-host Hoda Kotb that it’s “too much to bear to think that I brought this to her bedside, that it’s because of me.”
“I’m so sorry, Mommy, I’m so sorry,” Savannah Guthrie said.
And to her family, she apologized through tears, “If it is me, I’m so sorry.”
But she added, “We still don’t know … Honestly, we don’t know anything.”
Savannah Guthrie said her family “cannot be at peace” without answers.
“Someone can do the right thing,” she said.
Anyone with information is urged to call 911, the FBI at 1-800-CALL-FBI, or the Pima County Sheriff’s Department at 520-351-4900.
Editor’s Note: The story has updated the time frame of when the DNA sample was received
: Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell listens to a question during a Principles of Economics class at Harvard University on March 30, 2026 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. (Photo by Sophie Park/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The Department of Justice is dropping its criminal investigation into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, ending a standoff that threatened to delay the confirmation of Powell’s successor at the central bank, District of Columbia U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro said Friday.
Senior DOJ officials have contacted senators in recent days, including Republican Sen. Thom Tillis, who sits on the Senate Banking Committee, informing them of the plan to drop the probe and refer the matter regarding alleged cost overruns at the Fed’s Washington headquarters to the bank’s internal watchdog, sources told ABC News.
The Fed’s independent inspector general conducted an audit of the building renovation costs in 2021 and Powell had already asked the watchdog to take a fresh look at the $2.5 billion project last year.
“This morning the Inspector General for the Federal Reserve has been asked to scrutinize the building costs overruns — in the billions of dollars — that have been borne by taxpayers,” Pirro write on X Friday. “I expect a comprehensive report in short order and am confident the outcome will assist in resolving, once and for all, the questions that led this office to issue subpoenas.”
“Accordingly, I have directed my office to close our investigation as the IG undertakes this inquiry,” Pirro wrote. “Note well, however, that I will not hesitate to restart a criminal investigation should the facts warrant doing so.”
Powell’s term ends next month, but he said in March that he would stay in the position until President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Fed, Kevin Warsh, is confirmed.
White House spokesperson Kush Desai, in a statement to ABC News, said “American taxpayers deserve answers about the Federal Reserve’s fiscal mismanagement, and the Office of the Inspector General’s more powerful authorities best position it to get to the bottom of the matter.”
Desai added the administration remains certain that the Senate will “swiftly confirm” Warsh.
A spokesperson for the Federal Reserve declined to comment. Reached by ABC News, a spokesperson for Tillis also declined to comment.
Pirro had been insistent that her investigation of alleged cost overruns at the Fed would continue despite a ruling last month from D.C. District Judge James Boasberg that tossed out subpoenas she had sent to Powell.
“This investigation continues. I am in the legal lane. There are others who are in the political lane. I don’t intersect those two lanes,” Pirro said in a news conference on Wednesday.
“I am going forward,” Pirro said. “We are appealing the decision of Judge Boasberg — the idea that a judge can stand at the door of a grand jury and tell a prosecutor you’re not allowed to go in when the United States Supreme Court has said you can go into a grand jury based on rumors and suspicion, is an order that we think must be appealed, and we are continuing in this investigation.”
At the time of Boasberg’s ruling, Tillis urged Pirro not to continue with her investigation.
“We all know how this is going to end and the D.C. U.S. Attorney’s Office should save itself further embarrassment and move on,” Tillis said in a post on X moments after the decision was made public in March. “Appealing the ruling will only delay the confirmation of Kevin Warsh as the next Fed Chair.”
It is not immediately clear if prosecutors will seek to drop their appeal of Boasberg’s order as a result of the directive to close the probe into Powell.
In a video message in January, Powell revealed the investigation and called it an attempt by the Trump administration to put political pressure on the Fed to lower interest rates.
An end to the DOJ’s investigation is expected to pave the path for Kevin Warsh to get confirmed through the Senate. Tillis told ABC News on Tuesday he supports Warsh as the nominee but will not advance his nomination until the DOJ’s probe is dropped.
Tillis first announced in January that he would block nominees in opposition to the investigation, which he has branded as “bogus.”
“If there were any remaining doubt whether advisers within the Trump Administration are actively pushing to end the independence of the Federal Reserve, there should now be none. It is now the independence and credibility of the Department of Justice that are in question,” Tillis said in a January statement. “I will oppose the confirmation of any nominee for the Fed — including the upcoming Fed Chair vacancy — until this legal matter is fully resolved.”
Tillis’ blockade has proved difficult for Senate Republican leadership to work around because of his position on the narrowly divided Senate Banking Committee. His opposition, paired with that of all Democrats on the panel, has made it impossible for Warsh to advance out of the committee to a vote on the full Senate floor.
Tyler Robinson, center, accused in the fatal shooting of Charlie Kirk, appears during a hearing in 4th District Court on January 16, 2026 in Provo, Utah. (Bethany Baker-Pool/Getty Images)
(PROVO, Utah) — Tyler Robinson, the man accused of killing conservative activist Charlie Kirk, allegedly told his boyfriend, “I had the opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk, and I took it,” according to newly unsealed court documents.
On Sept. 10, 2025, the day of the shooting, Robinson allegedly sent his boyfriend a message that said, “drop what you are doing, look under my keyboard,” according to the search warrant affidavit.
Robinson’s boyfriend told police that he found a handwritten letter under the keyboard, the documents said.
ABC News first reported on the existence of the letter in September.
Police said they reviewed the boyfriend’s photo of the letter. The note read, according to the documents, “If you are reading this per my text, then I am so sorry. I left the house this morning on a mission, and set an auto text.”
“I am likely dead, or facing a lengthy prison sentence,” the letter continued, according to the documents. “I had the opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk, and I took it. I don’t know if I will/have succeeded, but I had hoped to make it home to you. I wish we could have lived in a world where this did not feel necessary.”
Kirk was shot and killed in the middle of his outdoor event at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah. The 31-year-old was the founder of the conservative youth activist organization Turning Point USA, and the Utah Valley event marked the first stop of his “The American Comeback Tour,” which invited students on college campuses to debate hot-button issues.
Robinson allegedly fled the scene of the shooting, prompting a massive manhunt. He surrendered to authorities on the night of Sept. 11.
He was charged with aggravated murder, felony discharge of a firearm causing serious bodily injury, obstruction of justice, two counts of witness tampering and commission of a violent offense in the presence of a child. He has not entered a plea.
Ballots are counted on election night at the Fulton County Elections Hub and Operation Center on November 5, 2024 in Fairburn, Georgia. (Photo by Megan Varner/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The FBI’s application for the warrant that led to the search and seizure of more than 650 boxes of 2020 election records from a Fulton County, Georgia, election site in January lacked any kind of evidence of intentional misconduct and relied on incorrect information, an elections expert with twenty years of experience told a federal judge Friday.
Testifying as Fulton County’s first witness in its lawsuit against the Trump administration, Ryan Macias told the court that his review of the claims made by the FBI in their application lacked a “basis in reality.”
“The content of the witnesses is incorrect and in many cases contradictory,” he said. “The information in there is not based in reality.”
Lawyers with the Department of Justice attempted to cast doubt on Macias’ testimony by arguing he lacks direct knowledge of the testimony in the case and is inexperienced in criminal investigations, though he was only qualified as an expert on election administration. Macias worked for both the federal government and California to administer elections as well as consulted for Fulton County in 2020.
Assistant Attorney General Tysen Duva broadly claimed, without citing any examples, that criminal investigations regularly stem from matters where initial investigations found no evidence of wrongdoing.
“Are you aware that happens all the time?” Duva asked Macias.
“No,” Macias responded.
“That’s because you don’t know,” Duva responded.
During his direct examination, Macias went through each of the claims made in the FBI’s application for the warrant to debunk and cast doubt on each allegation.
“Do ballot images have any impact on the final tabulation of ballots?” asked attorney Kamal Ghali, referencing the claim that election officials produced inconsistent numbers of ballot images from the 2020 election.
“No they do not,” Macias said.
“Is the absence of ballot images evidence of misconduct?” Ghali asked.
“No it is not,” he responded.
Attorney Abbe Lowell, representing the Fulton County officials, argued that the search was based on incorrect information from unreliable witnesses related to claims that are years beyond the statute of limitations.
“A week doesn’t go by without someone in the administration making an allegation of voter fraud,” Lowell said before reminding the judge that the investigation itself originated from an attorney who tried to overturn the 2020 election who was previously sanctioned for making false claims about the outcome. Lowell said the reliance on the unreliable witnesses would make “George Orwell smile in his grave.”
DOJ attorneys have insisted that the search was based on evidence of potential misconduct and accused Fulton County officials of speculating about “some kind of grand conspiracy.”
“It just seems like a loosey-goosey theory,” said DOJ attorney Michael Weisbuch. “They don’t like the vibe of what’s happening because that’s not a constitutional standard.”
U.S. District Judge JP Boulee, a Trump appointee, will decide on Fulton County’s request to force the Trump administration to return the sensitive records taken from the election site.
After election officials raised concerns about the basis for the January 2026 search, Judge Boulee last month ordered the Department of Justice to publicly release the application for the warrant, which revealed that the investigation was triggered by an attorney and close ally of President Trump who sought to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
According to the unsealed court records, the investigation centers on long-debunked allegations of voter fraud that have already been thoroughly investigated.
Fulton County election officials have since pushed for the return of the records, arguing that the investigation focuses on “human errors that its own sources confirm occur in almost every election … without any intentional wrongdoing whatsoever.”
“The Affidavit omits numerous material facts — including from the very reports and publicly-disclosed investigations that the Affiant cites — that confirm the alleged conduct was previously investigated and found to be unintentional,” attorneys for the Fulton County officials argued.
In a late setback ahead of Friday’s hearing, Judge Boulee quashed an attempt to force the FBI agent behind the search warrant to testify, concluding that questioning the agent could reveal “process and scope of the DOJ’s investigation,” which remains ongoing.
President Donald Trump has long criticized the outcome of the 2020 election results in Georgia, personally pushing to overturn the results after his loss and later being indicted in two criminal cases over his actions. Those cases have since been dismissed, and Trump has continued to push for criminal accountability for what he baselessly alleged was a stolen election.
Through a call with Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard — who was present at the January raid — President Trump personally addressed some of the agents who conducted the search and told them they were doing great work by investigating Georgia’s elections, ABC News previously reported.
“I was at Fulton County, sir, at the request of the president and to work with the FBI to observe this action that had long been awaited,” Gabbard told lawmakers earlier this month when asked about her presence at the search. “It is my role based on statute that Congress has passed to have oversight over election security to include counterintelligence.”
