Texts deleted from January 6 found on 10 Secret Service staff phones OLASMEDIA TV NEWSThis is what we have for you today:
The US Secret Service has identified missing text messages related to the Capitol riots on the phones of 10 agency personnel, according to a report. from CNN.
The federal agency is investigating phones that contain metadata showing that the messages were sent and received on or about January 6, 2021, the network reports on July 23.
An investigation followed a letter from a US Department of Homeland Security inspector general — first reported by The Interception and shared by the select House committee investigating the attack on the US Capitol — finding messages from agency personnel missing or erased.
The Secret Service — the agency responsible for protecting the president and senior officials — told the inspector general’s office that a large number of messages had been deleted as part of a “device replacement” program.
DHS Inspector General Joseph Cuffar requested texts from 24 Secret Service personnel involved in the Jan. 6, 2021 response, though only one text was produced.
In a statement on July 14, a Secret Service spokesperson denied that the staff had “maliciously deleted text messages.”
“In fact, the Secret Service has fully cooperated with the [DHS inspector general] in every way – be it interviews, documents, emails or texts,” said Anthony Guglielmi.
He said that in January 2021, “before any inspection” was opened, the agency began restoring its mobile phones to factory settings “as part of a three-month pre-planned system migration”.
“During that process, data was lost on some phones,” he said.
The Inspector General’s request for answers regarding possible missing text messages was followed by a congressional subpoena and criminal investigation into the matter, in addition to a series of extraordinary maneuvers this week as the House’s select committee delivered damning testimony and revealed evidence linking the Donald Trump administration to violence in the halls of Congress.
House selection committee members have said the agency should have retained the data before migrating the data from the devices, citing a letter sent from congressional committees to several federal agencies on Jan. 16, 2021, urging them to adopt stick to the data related to January 6 .
Secret Service personnel were invoked in several testimonies before the House select committee, leading a serious investigation into the conduct of then-President Trump and his efforts to provoke a mob and the outcome of the 2020 presidential election. to undermine.
A former White House aide testified before the committee that the former president tried to grab the wheel of the presidential limousine and lunged at a Secret Service agent as a supposedly furious Trump was told not to take the caravan to the Capitol as part of his press campaign against then Vice President Mike Pence to reject the electoral college votes.
Meanwhile, Secret Service agents helped guide Mr. Pence to a safe location when a pro-Trump mob broke through the Capitol.