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You are here: Home / Jan 6: Hearings / More January 6th texts go *poof*

More January 6th texts go *poof*

by Betty Cracker|  July 29, 20222:52 pm| 120 Comments

This post is in: Jan 6: Hearings, Open Threads, Politics

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The Washington Post reports that more texts that might have provided important evidence for the January 6th investigation have gone missing, and the details sure sound familiar:

Text messages for President Donald Trump’s acting homeland security secretary Chad Wolf and acting deputy secretary Ken Cuccinelli are missing for a key period leading up to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, according to four people briefed on the matter and internal emails.

This discovery of missing records for the senior-most Homeland Security officials, which has not been previously reported, increases the volume of potential evidence that has vanished regarding the time around the Capitol attack…

The Department of Homeland Security notified the agency’s inspector general in late February that Wolf’s and Cuccinelli’s texts 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 record obtained by the Project on Government Oversight and shared with The Washington Post.

Just as in the case of the vanishing Secret Service texts, DHS Inspector General Cuffari failed to get to the bottom of why the texts were deleted and failed to notify Congress about the missing data. Interestingly, Cuffari joined DHS as IG during the Trump administration. He is a former policy advisor to AZ governors Ducey and Brewer.

Following an administration as thoroughly corrupt as Trump’s, I imagine it takes a while to de-rat the woodpile. Reps. Thompson and Maloney already requested that Cuffari recuse from the Secret Service investigation because they question his ability to conduct an independent and competent investigation. Now that Cuffari has provided ample cause, lets hope he gets the boot from the agency altogether.

Open thread.

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Reader Interactions

120Comments

  1. 1.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    July 29, 2022 at 2:54 pm

    I think Carol Leonnig is going to replace Ronan Farrow as the phone message that makes people go, “Oh, shit”

  2. 2.

    Omnes Omnibus

    July 29, 2022 at 2:55 pm

    I am hoping they get these guys for obstruction but also recover the deleted material and nail them on the substantive counts as well.

  3. 3.

    Old School

    July 29, 2022 at 2:56 pm

    It’s hard to know where to begin with the inaccuracies in this reporting. @mariasacchetti @CarolLeonnig gave me just hours to “respond” while I was traveling. Had they actually attempted to reach me this is what I would have said…

    Chad Wolf (@ChadFWolf) July 29, 2022

    —

    Chad, I don’t see you citing any inaccuracies. Please let us know what you believe they are and we will be happy to review. We reported the facts, as documented in correspondence with your former agency. 1) Your texts are missing.2) DHS said the reason is they reset your phone.

    Carol Leonnig (@CarolLeonnig)July 29, 2022

  4. 4.

    O. Felix Culpa

    July 29, 2022 at 2:58 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Agreed on all counts.

    @Old School:

    I’d like to report a murder.

  5. 5.

    JoyceH

    July 29, 2022 at 3:00 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I’m an old straight lady, but I have such a crush on that beautiful young man! Geez, when Mia had that baby and named him Satchel of all things, who imagined he’d grow up to be so lovely, and such a menace to evil-doers!

  6. 6.

    David 🌈☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

    July 29, 2022 at 3:02 pm

     WASHINGTON — (AP) Department of Justice officials report Al Capone’s text messages shortly before and shortly after the St. Valentine’s Day massacre are missing. Reached at this office, Mr. Capone said, “fuggetaboutit, shit happens”.​

  7. 7.

    NotMax

    July 29, 2022 at 3:05 pm

    This was all over prime time MSNBC programs yesterday.

  8. 8.

    Geminid

    July 29, 2022 at 3:05 pm

    Ken Cuccinelli is a bad actor. He was a terrible Virginia Attorney General 2009-2013, just a bible thumping asshole. Then he lost a close Governor race to Terry McAuliffe. He’s been hovering around conservative politics looking for trouble ever since. Even Republicans hate Cuccinelli, which is why he was only an acting assistant DHS secretary. He could never get confirmed by the Republican Senate.

  9. 9.

    Betty Cracker

    July 29, 2022 at 3:06 pm

    @JoyceH: I loved Farrow’s response when asked about the rumor that Frank Sinatra is his real dad. He said couldn’t that be true of all of us?

  10. 10.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    July 29, 2022 at 3:07 pm

    @JoyceH:

    Geez, when Mia had that baby and named him Satchel of all thing

    As I recall that wasn’t Mia’s idea, or his father’s. I mean, I’m sure Sinatra was a baseball fan, but….

  11. 11.

    zhena gogolia

    July 29, 2022 at 3:10 pm

    @Old School:

    Tweet responding to Chad:

    pic.twitter.com/0lBOmRDSpg— BAN ASSAULT WEAPONS NOW! (@IskraDavidPhoto) July 29, 2022 “It was the fuck around of times, it was the find out of times” — Charles Dickens

  12. 12.

    dmsilev

    July 29, 2022 at 3:14 pm

    Because a lot of these idiots were deeply incompetent, I figure we will soon learn that there are documents explaining exactly what they should all do to  ‘accidentally lose’ their text message history. Probably signed by Jared.

  13. 13.

    Nelle

    July 29, 2022 at 3:15 pm

    What?  Is the NSA sitting on its hands and doesn’t have these “missing” texts?  Ask New Zealand then or any other of the Five Eyes gang…..  I’m always told that things digital leave fingerprints and never totally disappear.

    I had an acquaintance who was murdered by her husband and they retrieved all of his deletions which pretty much sealed the deal (well, and their daughter, whom he thought was asleep, heard something).  Would sledgehammers and throwing stuff in the ocean thoroughly disappear incriminating digital info?

  14. 14.

    Ken

    July 29, 2022 at 3:16 pm

    I’ve not been keeping up on this story. Are these the text messages on Hillary’s server in Ukraine, or the ones on Hunter Biden’s laptop in New Jersey?

  15. 15.

    Geminid

    July 29, 2022 at 3:17 pm

    There will be a vote in the House this evening on legislation including an assault weapons ban. There is little chance it will pass the Senate, but Democrats and Republicans are taking it very seriously and it’s thought the vote will be close.

  16. 16.

    Mallard Filmore

    July 29, 2022 at 3:18 pm

    In the ‘every little footnote points to a rabbit hole that is SO productive’ department, DailyKos has a posting:

    https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/7/29/2113348/-About-those-10-000-National-Guard-troops-Trump-ordered-deployed

    … Which brings me back to Miller’s deposition, and specifically this comment he made:

    “We obviously had plans for activating more folks, but that was not anything more than contingency planning,” Miller added. “There was no official message traffic or anything of that nature.”

    … If the J6 Committee has Miller’s contingency planning they need to share it with the nation. Why has this not already been done?

    Because the lack of security was deliberate.

    Because the absence of contingencies was deliberate.

    Because the leaders of every agency involved in the security planning of that day understood what was expected of them: to do nothing.

    The Secret Service was directly involved in security planning, and their texts go missing. DHS was in charge of coordinating all of the agencies involved in security planning, and now their leader’s text messages have also been disappeared.

    This was not just Trump’s coup attempt. …

  17. 17.

    Yutsano

    July 29, 2022 at 3:21 pm

    *sigh*

    There’s always a Chad…

  18. 18.

    Gravenstone

    July 29, 2022 at 3:23 pm

    It should be little surprise that Trump and his enablers did everything they could to compromise DHS and its member enforcement agencies (just look at the horror show they unleashed at CBP). And while the device reset with a newly incoming administration may make for a semi-plausible excuse, we all know they’re just covering their criming to the best of their limited ability.

  19. 19.

    Formerly disgruntled in Oregon

    July 29, 2022 at 3:24 pm

    Related-ish:

    WaPo: Russian national indicted for U.S. political influence operation

    In 2017 and 2019, Ionov allegedly monitored and supported the campaigns of two Americans running for local office, identified in court papers only as Unindicted Co-Conspirator-3 and Unindicted Co-Conspirator-4.

    Hmm – these unindicted co-conspirators are politicians in Florida…

    The 24-page indictment does not name the groups but charges that Ionov also advised the campaigns of two unidentified political candidates in Florida.

  20. 20.

    Almost Retired

    July 29, 2022 at 3:24 pm

    @Yutsano:  Always.  I’ve never heard anyone say “Chad” without following it with “that guy’s a dick.”

  21. 21.

    JoyceH

    July 29, 2022 at 3:27 pm

    I thought I kept up with the news pretty well but this vote today on an assault weapons ban fairly blindsided me. I think it’s great they’re getting everyone on record before the midterms!

  22. 22.

    Villago Delenda Est

    July 29, 2022 at 3:28 pm

    “The boot”?  Cuffari needs to be booted into a cell for a spell.

  23. 23.

    cain

    July 29, 2022 at 3:31 pm

    @Ken: The next scandal is that Hunter’s laptop talked to Hillary’s server! THEY TALKED! LOTS OF PACKETS EXCHANGED!

  24. 24.

    Kelly

    July 29, 2022 at 3:31 pm

    @Almost Retired: I have a lovely cousin Chad who plays the violin bluegrass classical whatever he can get out of that fiddle

  25. 25.

    Betty Cracker

    July 29, 2022 at 3:31 pm

    @Nelle: The only case I can remember reading about where a suspect successfully obliterated evidence was Adam Lanza, the Sandy Hook shooter. IIRC, he took a hammer to his devices’ innards, and no amount of forensic work could recover the data.

  26. 26.

    Urza

    July 29, 2022 at 3:33 pm

    I know little about the secure phones the government uses.  A normal phone the txts would be stored by the phone company.  A government phone shouldn’t they be stored on a server somewhere for normal record keeping?  Why is it hard to retrieve them at all?

  27. 27.

    zhena gogolia

    July 29, 2022 at 3:35 pm

    @Kelly: yes let’s not ruin another name like Karen

  28. 28.

    Urza

    July 29, 2022 at 3:36 pm

    @Betty Cracker: The hammer method is only good for data that was never transmitted though.  Txt messages had to go through servers and network switches to get to the other person, and unless its built explicitly to not keep them, should be replicated somewhere for retrieval late, like when you get a new phone.

  29. 29.

    Steve in the ATL

    July 29, 2022 at 3:36 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus: ​
     this is the correct take

  30. 30.

    Leto

    July 29, 2022 at 3:37 pm

    @Formerly disgruntled in Oregon: I’m going through the article and it’s just brazen what they did/are probably still doing. Citizens United opened a pathway for outside foreign influence, and the Russians and Republicans made perfect partners.

    At least one of the Americans dealing with Ionov seemed to understand that the Russian government was backing his efforts. According to authorities, after returning from Russia, the leader of the St. Petersburg group said it was clear Ionov’s group was “an instrument” of the Russian government but added that did not “disturb us.” In a follow-up email discussion, leaders of the group discussed that it was “more than likely” that the Russian government was using Ionov’s group to sow division inside the United States, according to the Justice Department.

    I want all them to fucking burn. All of them.

  31. 31.

    NotMax

    July 29, 2022 at 3:40 pm

    @zhena gogolia

    Too late.

    Chad has been the accepted testosteronic version of Karen for quite a spell.

  32. 32.

    trollhattan

    July 29, 2022 at 3:40 pm

    Simply that based on name alone, “Chad Wolf” must be one of America’s most-punchable men.

  33. 33.

    Almost Retired

    July 29, 2022 at 3:40 pm

    @Kelly:  “except for that Chad.  That one’s not a dick”  :)

  34. 34.

    ETtheLibrarian

    July 29, 2022 at 3:41 pm

    I don’t for a second believe that DHS doesn’t know how to reset government phones.  Cellphones have been around for a while and they do this pretty regularly. This stretches the bounds of credulity.

    But….for sake of argument lets say it is true. Then there are some people that don’t need to be working for the federal government particularly DHS.

    This feels like the DHS equivalent of blaming the intern.

  35. 35.

    Gravenstone

    July 29, 2022 at 3:43 pm

    @Leto: I want all them to fucking burn.

    I’d be good making this a literal outcome.

  36. 36.

    jnfr

    July 29, 2022 at 3:47 pm

    I so much want to see the DOJ take this seriously. This shit is illegal and shouldn’t be ignored.

  37. 37.

    Scout211

    July 29, 2022 at 3:49 pm

    @Old School:  Chad Wolf, the acting director of DHS is blaming “DHS” for his missing texts?

    Wasn’t he DHS? So confused.  🙄

    @ChadFWolf
    Replying to
    @ChadFWolf

    I complied with all data retention laws and returned all my equipment fully loaded to the Department. Full stop. DHS has all my texts, emails, phone logs, schedules, etc. Any issues with missing data needs to be addressed to DHS. To imply otherwise is lazy reporting.

  38. 38.

    Betty Cracker

    July 29, 2022 at 3:52 pm

    @Leto: The St. Pete group in question is the Uhuru movement, who are notorious crackpots in the Tampa Bay area. I’m not saying this isn’t a serious case — it’s good that the feds busted the Russian who was attempting influence operations. But I find it somewhat comforting that the Russians have invested time and money in crackpots like the Uhurus, who get stomped every time they run for office because they’re nuttier than squirrel turds. That’s money Russians weren’t investing in turning Republicans.

  39. 39.

    rikyrah

    July 29, 2022 at 3:54 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Me too😠😠😠

  40. 40.

    dmsilev

    July 29, 2022 at 3:55 pm

    @Ken: Plot twist: It was Jimmy Carter and his secret DEC PDP-11.

  41. 41.

    Omnes Omnibus

    July 29, 2022 at 3:58 pm

    @Steve in the ATL: I will giggle hysterically.

  42. 42.

    germy shoemangler

    July 29, 2022 at 3:58 pm

    Member of the “problem solvers” caucus has an opinion:

    Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips says he would NOT back Biden running in 2024. “I think the country would be well-served by a new generation of compelling, well-prepared, dynamic Democrats who step up.” https://t.co/MdNQgZXKAL

    — Manu Raju (@mkraju) July 29, 2022

    Centrist Democrat explicitly saying Biden is the wrong choice for 2024. Keep that in mind when people point fingers at progressives as not doing enough to support the president. https://t.co/yklahDOvJ3

    — Eva McKend (@evamckend) July 29, 2022

  43. 43.

    UncleEbeneezer

    July 29, 2022 at 3:58 pm

    Nothing to see here:

    Nothing to see here. <thread> “Meadows burned papers after meeting with Scott Perry, Jan. 6 panel told” report by @woodruffbets and @kyledcheney from May 2022 (Putting the US Secret Service and DHS deleted communications in broader context)

    2. Nothing to see here. Dec. 26, 2020: Meadows and Rep. Perry used Signal, an encrypted messaging platform, when discussing elevating Clark to the position of acting attorney general. Jan.5, 2021: A member of Congress texted Meadows, “Please check your signal.”

    …

  44. 44.

    scav

    July 29, 2022 at 3:59 pm

    And guess who else had a series of unfortunate events with lost messages and backups and phones falling into the sea etc. — more whoopsies! of potential damning evidence?  More show-biz shenanigans from the Vardy-Wagatha argy-bargy (which I finally failed to avoid today).  Can we confidently distinguish the FFG’s covfefe administration from a celebrity kurfuffle? With a bit of techie update of the GWB admin’s outbreak of I cannot recallitis.

  45. 45.

    Gravenstone

    July 29, 2022 at 4:00 pm

    @dmsilev: Flashback! The mainframe on our campus back in the dark ages was a PDP-11/44, if I recall correctly. For some reason, the CS department was inordinately proud of that factoid.

  46. 46.

    HumboldtBlue

    July 29, 2022 at 4:02 pm

    @Yutsano:

    Always.

  47. 47.

    Gravenstone

    July 29, 2022 at 4:05 pm

    @Scout211: Ya know, he could be telling the truth and someone else at DHS is responsible for making all these troublesome texts vanish. Of course, whomever the responsible party(s) are need to be sussed out and charged accordingly.

    Or, he could be another lying weasel who is just trying to deflect blame. In either event, investigate and act accordingly.

  48. 48.

    The Moar You Know

    July 29, 2022 at 4:05 pm

    I complied with all data retention laws and returned all my equipment fully loaded to the Department. Full stop. DHS has all my texts, emails, phone logs, schedules, etc. Any issues with missing data needs to be addressed to DHS.

    @Scout211: this is very likely true.  I would bet money on it, in fact.  The equipment would be wiped as is usual, to be returned to service.  Looking at the actual equipment – the cell phones, etc – is looking in the wrong place.  Especially now, 18 months after the fact.

    What needs to be looked at is the cloud infrastructure that data resided on.  AWS or Microsoft, most likely.  And that could be easy to find, or it may be gone beyond all recovery.  This being the Trump admin we’re talking about, I expect rank incompetence, but this is also DHS and they have access/flat-out employ some of the best of the best.

    My opinion as someone who has done lower-level forensic work before:  those texts/emails/voicemails – the entirety of digital evidence under the control of DHS/Secret Service – are gone beyond recovery.  All of them.  I would very much like to be proven wrong about that.

  49. 49.

    danielx

    July 29, 2022 at 4:07 pm

    @Almost Retired: ​
     
    Guy across the street from me is named Chad, and yeah, my impression is he’s kind of a dick.

  50. 50.

    bbleh

    July 29, 2022 at 4:09 pm

    @Urza: Indeed, why should it be hard to retrieve them, when everybody involved agrees it was just a little “oopsie” that just happened to involve the two days surrounding an insurrection organized and supported by a President with whom they were particularly close, and nobody intended to violate the Presidential Records Act or subvert an investigation into the insurrection.  I mean, that would be just the most remarkable coincidence!

  51. 51.

    Steeplejack

    July 29, 2022 at 4:12 pm

    @Ken:

    Well played.

  52. 52.

    Captain C

    July 29, 2022 at 4:16 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    I think Carol Leonnig is going to replace Ronan Farrow as the phone message that makes people go, “Oh, shit”

    “Hi boss!  We have Carol Leonnig, Ronan Farrow, and Isaac Chotiner on the line.”

    “Tell them I just jumped out my window!  Which I am doing right now!”

  53. 53.

    Jeffery

    July 29, 2022 at 4:17 pm

    Zombie Rose Mary Woods strikes again.

  54. 54.

    UncleEbeneezer

    July 29, 2022 at 4:21 pm

    @The Moar You Know: Yeah, my wife who manages device migrations for a major media company with 10’s of 1,000’s of devices when she first heard the original story was like “oh that shit’s gone.”  Executives at her company NEVER do the proper backing up that they are supposed to do (because nobody can force them to) and there are always significant data losses.

    That said, a former FBI agent on MuellerSheWrote’s podcast noted just yesterday that even if their official txts are gone, most SS also carry and use their own personal phones to reach out to family, friends etc.  He thinks there is probably still a trove of information we could get by pursuing SS agents’ personal phone records for that period.  After all, we know SS agents were calling/texting their families during 1/6 when things looked dire.  Undoubtedly some used other phones that had cloud backup that could be accessed through their phone carriers.

  55. 55.

    UncleEbeneezer

    July 29, 2022 at 4:23 pm

    BREAKING: CNN now reporting that the totally cool DHS OIG Cuffari knew about missing text messages in MAY OF 2021.

  56. 56.

    Mike in NC

    July 29, 2022 at 4:25 pm

    Everybody who worked for Trump spent a couple hours a day flushing toilets. Nothing unseemly was going on there. Nothing at all!

  57. 57.

    mrmoshpotato

    July 29, 2022 at 4:29 pm

    Subpoena some cell phone companies.  Enjoy their “Surprise, motherfuckers!”  Arrest said motherfuckers.

  58. 58.

    HumboldtBlue

    July 29, 2022 at 4:30 pm

    @Mike in NC:

    Or burning documents and stealing items from the White House.

  59. 59.

    Leto

    July 29, 2022 at 4:31 pm

    @Betty Cracker: that’s partially good news, but considering how deep the Russians have penetrated into the Republican party, I’m just going to continue to believe it’s all Russians/Republicans all the way down.

  60. 60.

    Edmund Dantes

    July 29, 2022 at 4:32 pm

    @scav: W’s admin also lost millions of emails and cia torture tapes.

  61. 61.

    Leto

    July 29, 2022 at 4:33 pm

    @UncleEbeneezer: how the fuck that assclown, or any Trumpov appointed/hired assclown, still has a fucking job is beyond me. Put them on the conservative wingnut welfare circuit post haste.

  62. 62.

    Layer8Problem

    July 29, 2022 at 4:35 pm

    I worked at a shop which had, among lotsa other stuff, a call center, which as part of the “quality assurance” stuff the call center switches loved to tell you about before they connected you with an agent, recorded tons of conversations. And we had call detail records and piles of logs with metadata about who talked to whom and for how long. I’ll defer to the more knowledgeable but phone companies I believe save texts and call records for possible forensic interest; the Feds are supposed to be medieval about their systems’ stuff and their retention. How did they expect to just make it go away? Even if it were possible, someone’s got a name in a log on disks (plural) saying they did a BIG delete out of normal procedure.

  63. 63.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2022 at 4:39 pm

    @dmsilev:

    I think my calculator has more power than a PDP-11

    I’m sure my cell phone does.

  64. 64.

    Baud

    July 29, 2022 at 4:45 pm

    @Leto:

    It’s called burrowing.  They put him in the civil service, so he’s not removable at will

    ETA: Never mind.  I think you were talking about Cucinelli.  I think the IG’s are also protected from removal though.

  65. 65.

    Aaron

    July 29, 2022 at 4:47 pm

    Isn’t this the same DHS IG that investigated the violent police attack on pedestrians, when president orange clown wanted to give a speech in front of the WH neighboring church?
    I believe the result of that one was “the gun went off by itself, no one knows why and no one is responsible.”

  66. 66.

    Layer8Problem

    July 29, 2022 at 4:49 pm

    @Layer8Problem:

    the Feds are supposed to be medieval about their systems’ stuff and their retention.

    Hm, I meant medieval in the “go full Marcellus Wallace on the wayward federal employee” sense, not the “check with the blokes in the scriptorium and see if they got the new shipment of parchment yet” sense.

  67. 67.

    Cameron

    July 29, 2022 at 4:49 pm

    @Betty Cracker: This was in an e-newsletter I got today:

    https://patch.com/florida/stpete/russian-misinformation-campaign-linked-st-pete-uhuru-house-report

  68. 68.

    NotMax

    July 29, 2022 at 4:52 pm

    @Layer8Problem

    Recently had occasion to purchase a service by phone*. Got the usual “This call may be recorded for quality assurance purposes” message beforehand – BUT (and the first time have encountered this) just prior to completion of the transaction the person on the other end of the line said, “I’m now going to ask for your credit card information and need to inform you I will be stopping the recording while you provide the information and restarting the recording after I finish entering it into the system.”

    *From a reputable firm. Somewhat oddly enough, the sole way to inquire about and sign up for it is by phone; not available to do online.

  69. 69.

    Leto

    July 29, 2022 at 4:56 pm

    @Baud: true. I was a former civil service member, and that had protections. But one of the things that can be done wrt removing them is document the shit out of all the things they fuck up. And considering how most of them are underqualified hires, they’re going to fuck up more than normal. Like this instance is just one of the most obvious, but this big one will be preceded by tons of smaller ones along the way. All that adds up to being able to fire them. IF… if they’re documented. Key thing there

    Edit: also yeah, burrowing. Ugh.

  70. 70.

    Captain C

    July 29, 2022 at 5:04 pm

    @dmsilev:

    Probably signed by Jared.

    Or by Beavis and/or Butthead in handwriting that looks suspiciously like Jared’s.

  71. 71.

    catclub

    July 29, 2022 at 5:04 pm

    @The Moar You Know: What needs to be looked at is the cloud infrastructure that data resided on.

     

    When I posted that the data should be on the phone company servers, I found that those are probably held no more than 90 days – which should have been plenty of time to subpeona them to be held.  Why not?

     

    I agree with Urza that NSA has them and/or other 5 eyes member.

  72. 72.

    Baud

    July 29, 2022 at 5:07 pm

    President Joe Biden on Friday nominated a lawyer who represented the Mississippi clinic at the heart of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to overturn its landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade abortion rights decision to become a federal appeals court judge.
    Biden’s latest slate of nine new judicial nominees included Julie Rikelman, an abortion rights lawyer with the Center for Reproductive Rights whom the president picked to serve on the Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

  73. 73.

    lee

    July 29, 2022 at 5:22 pm

    @Nelle: I work in IT. I’m not sure I could delete all copies of any file much less text messages.

  74. 74.

    Scout211

    July 29, 2022 at 5:24 pm

    @Baud:I think the IG’s are also protected from removal though.

    Nope.

    In a span of six weeks, Mr. Trump has removed five officials from posts leading their respective agencies’ inspector general offices, three of whom were working in an acting capacity.

    The president’s moves have prompted scrutiny and criticism from congressional Democrats, who accuse Mr. Trump of hollowing independent inspector general offices and retaliating against those that have exposed wrongdoing or missteps by his administration.

  75. 75.

    Another Scott

    July 29, 2022 at 5:26 pm

    @The Moar You Know: One thing I like to remember is: Text messages have a sender and a receiver.  SS and DHS wiping some of their phones doesn’t matter if the received texts are on someone else’s phone who doesn’t work there.

    We’ll see!

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  76. 76.

    jnfr

    July 29, 2022 at 5:30 pm

    @The Moar You Know:

    Damn. I hope you’re wrong too, but that is awfully plausible.

  77. 77.

    Another Scott

    July 29, 2022 at 5:30 pm

    @Edmund Dantes: W’s 22 million e-mails were found.

    AFAIK, you’re right about the CIA torture tapes.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  78. 78.

    J R in WV

    July 29, 2022 at 5:31 pm

    I’m thinking that the absence of this information is on the face of it enough to arrest all of these people for obstruction of justice, unless they can come up with the missing data. Every one of them!!

  79. 79.

    Mike in Pasadena

    July 29, 2022 at 5:32 pm

    Yes.

  80. 80.

    Geminid

    July 29, 2022 at 5:37 pm

    @Geminid: News from an hour ago:

        NEW- HOUSE DEMOCRATS have cleared a key procedural hurdle to debate and vote on assault weapons ban. 3 Democrats voted no: Rep. Gonzalez [TX-15] Rep. Golden [ME-2] Rep. Schrader [OR-5?]

    @Jake Sherman 

    The vote was 217-211. I guess not everyone was there. Sherman said that Democrats can afford 4 defections and that the vote boded well for final passage.

    Henry Cuellar (TX-28) was a yes. That’s no way to keep a “C” NRA rating!

  81. 81.

    Miss Bianca

    July 29, 2022 at 5:37 pm

    Open thread? Just got my second booster, waiting in the parking lot for my allotted time before driving off. Thank goodness that’s finally taken care of!

  82. 82.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    July 29, 2022 at 5:46 pm

    @Miss Bianca: Congrats!

  83. 83.

    sab

    July 29, 2022 at 5:49 pm

    Anyone remember Dick Cheney having a 24/7 months of shredding late in 2008?

  84. 84.

    Kent

    July 29, 2022 at 5:49 pm

    @NotMax:

    Too late.

    Chad has been the accepted testosteronic version of Karen for quite a spell.

    According to the Urban Dictionary, the female version of Chad is “Stacy”

  85. 85.

    Baud

    July 29, 2022 at 5:50 pm

    @Scout211:

    Thanks.  I guess one unfortunate things about a Dem president is that they care about appearances.  At least he’s fireable at will if there’s evidence of wrongdoing.

  86. 86.

    Baud

    July 29, 2022 at 5:55 pm

    @Geminid:

    I hope it satisfies whoever it needs to satisfy.

  87. 87.

    Kelly

    July 29, 2022 at 5:57 pm

    @Geminid: Schrader, scowl spit on the ground

  88. 88.

    Jim Appleton

    July 29, 2022 at 6:00 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Slightly OT, but open thread and amusing so …

    A curmudgeon uncle had a mutt named Satchel Paige, also a purebred dachshund named Willie Mays.  The AKC in about 1965 would not register the wiener under that name, but they did for Sweet William of Centerfield.

  89. 89.

    Fleeting Expletive

    July 29, 2022 at 6:01 pm

    Completely OT, thread before last, someone mentioned jangly guitars and named Leo Kottke as an example and made me ’bout fall on the floor.  I’ve been trying to clean up my vinyl collection, mostly ’70’s rock, and I have one of his albums. My best friend’s older sister dated him in high school or college, and the record has a handwritten dedication to Connie on it. Now I’ll have to listen to it and see how jangly his guitar is.

  90. 90.

    Geminid

    July 29, 2022 at 6:06 pm

    @Kelly: I think Schrader will be an unreliable vote for Democrats for the rest of this Congress. A sore loser.

  91. 91.

    Steve in the ATL

    July 29, 2022 at 6:14 pm

    @Gravenstone: yeah, but no one associated with the trump administration gets the benefit of the doubt.  Ever. To any degree.

  92. 92.

    trollhattan

    July 29, 2022 at 6:15 pm

    @Fleeting Expletive:

    Wow, great connection.

    Leo was mostly noted for complicated acoustic finger picking and maybe odd tunings (I’m terrible at picking those out) and also for his hilarious liner notes. He, John Fahey, Robbie Basho, among a few others, had a certain niche.

    I never thought of his style as jangly, TBH, but he’s a master, regardless.

  93. 93.

    eachother

    July 29, 2022 at 6:16 pm

    I like Chad Stuart of Chad and Jeremy.

    “A Summer Song”   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfvL2oLeBYs

  94. 94.

    Baud

    July 29, 2022 at 6:16 pm

    @Geminid:

    Has he been voting against everything? Do you think he’ll vote against the reconciliation package?

  95. 95.

    trollhattan

    July 29, 2022 at 6:16 pm

    @Kent: Abrams ain’t gonna like that.

  96. 96.

    Ken

    July 29, 2022 at 6:16 pm

    @J R in WV: arrest all of these people for obstruction of justice

    I’m hoping that this is like Al Capone on tax evasion — they may skate on the treasonous plot to overthrow the government, but the Regulations for Government Record Keeping turn out to have far more severe punishments.

    (Ideally there’s some secret cabal that passes judgment. “No, Mr. Wolf, you do not get a trial. We are the Archivists. Our authority comes from the original Constitution, not the highly-edited version we’ve allowed the public and Supreme Court to see. You will now be taken from this place and… filed.”)

  97. 97.

    Geminid

    July 29, 2022 at 6:17 pm

    @Baud: I think the idea is to give Democratic incumbents a strong position to run on in the midterms, and to give Democratic challengers something to hammer Republican “Nay” voters with.

    The legislation has other “crime fighting” measures also. They were subject to negotiations between two of their proponents, Spanberger and Gottheimer, and the Congressional Black Caucus, who may have had their own “asks.” They reached agreement yesterday  and that set the stage for today’s vote.

  98. 98.

    Anotherlurker

    July 29, 2022 at 6:17 pm

    @Fleeting Expletive: Which album?  Pay close attention to his 12-string slide work.  The man is on a different plane of musical existence.

  99. 99.

    UncleEbeneezer

    July 29, 2022 at 6:20 pm

    @Fleeting Expletive: Check out Julian Lage.  He usually plays a telecaster and loves to get a real jangly country-inspired tone.  He’s just an absolute phenom on guitar.  If you like this video, there are several videos from that same show that are all pretty killer.

  100. 100.

    Steve in the ATL

    July 29, 2022 at 6:21 pm

    @lee: can you help me recover my saved game file from Leisure Suit Larry?  I’ve been stressing about that since 1988.

  101. 101.

    Steve in the ATL

    July 29, 2022 at 6:23 pm

    @Fleeting Expletive: jangly guitars are NEVER OT!

  102. 102.

    Geminid

    July 29, 2022 at 6:26 pm

    @Baud: Schrader’s been a reliable vote for the Caucus so far. He’s been a pain in the ass in commitee work, especially on drug price controls. That’s one reason he lost his primary.

    I expect Schrader will vote for the reconcilation package, but he’s been a crybaby about losing his primary to Jaime McLeod Skinner and he might gum up other votes. Once a Minnesota special election this fall returns a Republican to Congress (as expected), Democrats will be down to a 3 seat margin I believe.

  103. 103.

    trollhattan

    July 29, 2022 at 6:26 pm

    @UncleEbeneezer:

    I saw him live “accidentally” because Lage and Eldridge opened for Aoife O’Donovan. Knew nothing about them but they were, in fact, amazing.

    Similarly, was introduced to Tony Rice when he was a member of the David Grisman Quintet.

    ETA Ry Cooder probably gets an entire category of his own, considering the span of his work.

  104. 104.

    Steve in the ATL

    July 29, 2022 at 6:28 pm

    @Betty Cracker: IIRC, which I think I usually do but my wife disagrees vehemently, “uhuru” is a Swahili word meaning “freedom” and was used commonly in the 1960’s by Africans trying to free themselves  from the yoke of European colonialism (and we all know King Leopold II is rotting in hell with hitler and Stalin).  Did not know that a bunch of nutballs in St. Pete (St. Pete!) had co-opted the term.

  105. 105.

    Steeplejack

    July 29, 2022 at 6:28 pm

    Ari Melber is doing a one-hour special, “Inside Trump’s Election Plot,” right now on MSNBC. It is bringing a lot of the threads together—maybe more informative for normies than hardcore jackals, but definitely interesting and filling in a lot of gaps. It will run again at 9:00 p.m. EDT.

  106. 106.

    James E Powell

    July 29, 2022 at 6:31 pm

    @Steve in the ATL:

    You got that right! Jangly Americana Rules.

  107. 107.

    NeenerNeener

    July 29, 2022 at 6:33 pm

    @Steve in the ATL: ROFLMFAO

  108. 108.

    Omnes Omnibus

    July 29, 2022 at 6:35 pm

    @NeenerNeener: Dude, I think he was serious.

  109. 109.

    zhena gogolia

    July 29, 2022 at 6:36 pm

    @eachother: Right!

  110. 110.

    jnfr

    July 29, 2022 at 6:36 pm

    @Steeplejack:

    And – this amazed me because Ari is pretty “by the book” legally – he started out by stating flatly “This was a coup attempt.”

  111. 111.

    zhena gogolia

    July 29, 2022 at 6:37 pm

    @trollhattan: I saw him open for Frank Zappa in Green Bay, WI.

  112. 112.

    Fleeting Expletive

    July 29, 2022 at 6:43 pm

    @Anotherlurker: It’s “Mudlark”, 1971. Connie and her twin graduated in ’63.  I don’t know when the record came to me.

  113. 113.

    Steeplejack

    July 29, 2022 at 6:46 pm

    @jnfr:

    Yeah, he is calling it a months-long, ongoing coup attempt. Just now deployed the trope (slightly paraphrased): “If they’re not prosecuted, it was a training exercise.”

  114. 114.

    jnfr

    July 29, 2022 at 6:55 pm

    @Steeplejack:

    So true. Really glad to see Melissa Murray on with him now.

  115. 115.

    Kent

    July 29, 2022 at 7:20 pm

    @Geminid:

    @Baud: Schrader’s been a reliable vote for the Caucus so far. He’s been a pain in the ass in commitee work, especially on drug price controls. That’s one reason he lost his primary.

    I expect Schrader will vote for the reconcilation package, but he’s been a crybaby about losing his primary to Jaime McLeod Skinner and he might gum up other votes. Once a Minnesota special election this fall returns a Republican to Congress (as expected), Democrats will be down to a 3 seat margin I believe.

    Since losing he has thrown a temper tantrum and endorsed Betsy Johnson, the “independent” former Democrat and most MAGA candidate in the Oregon governor’s race over the actual Democratic nominee.  Johnson is basically a folksy rural Joe Lieberman with more right wing positions.

    So fuck him.

  116. 116.

    NutmegAgain

    July 29, 2022 at 9:13 pm

    @Gravenstone: oooo — we had a PDP10 running TOPS 20. Known locally as the DEC20. Loved it!

  117. 117.

    Anonymous At Work

    July 29, 2022 at 9:33 pm

    Better idea is to do to the Trumpist rats what they did in Office Space to Milton: fix the bug where they get paid and have authority.

  118. 118.

    Sally

    July 29, 2022 at 10:20 pm

    1. @Yutsano: A hanging Chad
      ( And I mean hanging by a slender thread …. not hanged Chad )
  119. 119.

    SFAW

    July 30, 2022 at 12:11 am

    @Fleeting Expletive: ​
     
    I’m not exactly sure what “jangly” means, vis-a-vis guitar, but Kottke’s and Crenshaw’s style were not particularly similar, outside of Kottke sometimes playing a six-string.
    I wouldn’t say they’re as similar as Little Richard or Jerry Lee Lewis were to Keith Emerson, but It’s probably close.

  120. 120.

    SFAW

    July 30, 2022 at 12:15 am

    @trollhattan: ​
     

    I never thought of his style as jangly, TBH,

    With good reason. It wasn’t.
    Kottke “jangly”? JHC

    but he’s a master, regardless.

    Without a doubt.

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