Comment Text messages for former President Donald Trump’s acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf and Deputy Secretary Ken Cuccinelli are missing for a critical period before the Jan. 6 attack on Capitol Hill, according to four people briefed on the matter and internal email. This previously unreported discovery of missing files on senior national security officials adds to the volume of potential evidence that has disappeared about the time surrounding the attack on the Capitol. It comes as both congressional and criminal investigators at the Justice Department try to piece together an effort by the president and his allies to overturn the election results, which culminated in a pro-Trump rally that turned into a violent riot on the halls of Congress. The Department of Homeland Security notified the agency’s inspector general in late February that Wolf and Cuccinelli’s messages were lost in a “reset” of their government phones when they left their jobs in January 2021 in preparation for the new Biden administration, according to an internal file obtained by the Project on Government Oversight and shared with the Washington Post. The office of the department’s undersecretary for management also told the government watchdog that text messages for her boss, Undersecretary Randolph “Tex” Alles, the former director of the Secret Service, were also no longer available due to a scheduled phone reset. The office of Inspector General Joseph V. Cuffari did not press department leadership at the time to explain why they did not keep those records, or to seek ways to recover the lost data, according to the four people briefed on the watchdog’s actions. . Cuffari also failed to notify Congress of possible destruction of government records. The revelation comes after it was discovered that text messages from Secret Service agents – crucial first-hand witnesses to the events leading up to January 6 – were deleted more than a year ago and may never be recovered. News of the loss of their files sparked a firestorm because the texts could corroborate an account by a former White House aide describing the president’s state of mind on January 6. In one instance, aide Cassidy Hutchinson said a top official told her Trump had tried to attack a senior Secret Service agent who refused to take the president to the Capitol with his supporters marching there. In an almost identical scenario to that of the DHS leaders’ texts, the Secret Service notified Cuffari’s office seven months ago, in December 2021, that the agency had deleted thousands of text messages from agents and employees in a government-wide reset the service. phones. Cuffari’s office did not notify Congress until mid-July, despite pending requests from several congressional committees for those records. Wolf and Cuccinelli’s phone and text communications in the days leading up to Jan. 6 could have shed significant light on Trump’s actions and plans. In the weeks leading up to the attack on Capitol Hill, Trump had been pushing both men to help him claim the 2020 election results were rigged and even to seize voting machines in key states to try to “re-do” the election. “It is extremely troubling that the issue of deleted text messages related to the January 6 attack on Capitol Hill is not limited to the Secret Service, but also includes Chad Wolf and Ken Cuccinelli, who ran DHS at the time,” he added. Committee Chairman Bennie G. Thompson said in a statement. “It appears that the DHS Inspector General has known about these redacted texts for months but failed to inform Congress,” Thompson said. “If the Inspector General had briefed Congress, perhaps we could have gotten better information from senior administration officials about one of the most tragic days in our republic’s history.” Neither Cuccinelli nor Wolf responded to requests for comment. The DHS Office of Inspector General did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The discovery of missing files on the top officials who ran the Department of Homeland Security during the final days of the Trump administration raises new questions about what might have been learned, as well as what other text messages and evidence they may have deleted. the ministry and other agencies. , in apparent violation of the Federal Records Act. Wolf and Cuccinelli remained at DHS as Trump openly disputed the results of the 2020 election, even as the agency led efforts to help state and local governments safeguard the integrity of election results. Since late December, multiple DHS intelligence units across the country have been warning of extremely disturbing chatter on social media platforms by white nationalists and pro-Trumpers promoting coming armed to Trump’s Jan. 6 rally and using violence to stop Biden to become president. In late December, Trump commented in a Cabinet meeting that his secretaries were failing to help him investigate the fraud that had “corrupted” the election to Joe Biden, but cited unsubstantiated allegations. Trump was fired Christopher Krebs, former director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, in a tweet after Krebs took issue with Trump’s claims of widespread voter fraud and complained that Wolff should have moved more quickly to force Krebs out. On New Year’s Eve 2020, Trump also called Cuccinelli to pressure him to seize voting machines in swing states and help prevent a peaceful transfer of power. Trump falsely told him that the deputy attorney general had just said it was Cuccinelli’s job to grab voting machines “and you’re not doing your job.” Cuccinelli was in Washington the day of the attack and toured the Capitol that night to survey the damage. Wolff was on an official trip to the Middle East. After the attack on Capitol Hill, several lawmakers requested a hearing on why DHS failed to anticipate the threat posed by Trump supporters in Congress on the day lawmakers and Vice President Mike Pence planned to certify the election results. Wolf had resigned five days after the attack on Capitol Hill and cited “recent events” as well as legal rulings that questioned his legitimacy to continue leading the department as deputy secretary for 14 months. “Effective at 11:59 p.m. today, I am resigning as your deputy secretary,” Wolfe wrote in a message to the department. “I regret taking this step as it was my intention to serve the Department through the end of this Administration.” In an interview a few days later with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, the outgoing secretary said Trump had some responsibility for the events of January 6. “I was disappointed that the President didn’t talk about it sooner. I think he had a role to play in doing that. I think, unfortunately, the administration lost a little bit of the moral high ground on this issue by not coming out sooner on this,” he said of Trump not immediately condemning the violence. A 2020 Government Accountability Office report found that Wolf and Cuccinelli were ineligible to serve in their positions because their appointments had not followed the proper order of succession, a matter the GAO referred to the DHS Office of Inspector General. Unlike Trump, Wolff did not dispute the election results and said DHS is preparing for “a smooth and orderly transition to President-elect Biden’s DHS team.” “Welcome them, educate them and learn from them,” Wolff said at the time. “They are your leaders for the next four years – a time that will no doubt be full of challenges and opportunities to show the American public the value of DHS and why it is worth the investment.” Wolff had emerged as Trump’s favorite DHS Secretary, the president’s fourth pick for the post in just four years in office. Trump had promoted his first secretary John Kelly to be his White House chief of staff and then pushed Kelly out of that job for not complying with his orders. He had fired Kelly’s successor, Kirstjen Nielsen, for rejecting some of Trump’s demands on how to handle immigrants crossing the border, whom Nielsen knew were illegal. The third secretary, Nielsen’s successor, Kevin McAleenan, disillusioned with how Trump tried to politicize the department during his re-election bid, left after just seven months. Then Trump named Wolf as his acting secretary and found that the fourth time was a charm. Wolff has repeatedly touted Trump’s immigration record as astounding and also deployed department personnel to crack down on Black Lives Matter protesters in Portland to help push Trump’s law-and-order message to voters. Trump had appointed Cuccinelli to key DHS roles after seeing him champion his immigration agenda on television. Trump’s allies still believe Wolf has served him well. Wolf is among those listed this month in one Worthy article as someone Trump could ask to return to government service if Trump is a successful presidential candidate in 2024.
