I think the J6 committee already knows the contents of the missing texts from the Secret Service, DHS and now the DoD. Texts of top Trump officials in the Department of Defense wiped. The “missing texts” investigation is designed to reveal people involved in the cover up. It’s a setup to implicate Trumpers embedded in government. And it’s working, it’s already exposed actions and non-actions taken by Trump appointed Inspector General Joseph Cuffari. Monday, Reps. Bennie Thompson and Carolyn Maloney said they also have new evidence the inspector general’s office stopped trying to recover the missing records over a year ago. Link
“But Spocko,” you ask, “if the committee has copies of the texts, why didn’t they reveal them?” There are a couple of reasons. Not revealing the content now is giving the committee the opportunity to get more people in to “refresh their memory” and cut deals. They have said this explicitly.
The BS reasons given that the texts are missing are BS. However, they are used to give some people an out if they come forward with more information. (Remember, the J6 committee wants the information, not necessarily to prosecute everyone for all their crimes. That’s the DoJ’s job.)
Put yourself in the shoes of someone who KNOWS what’s in the texts AND KNOWS that the reasons given they disappeared are BS. The committee is giving people an excuse to come forward now and cut a deal. They are SAYING the texts were deleted and missing. They are NOT saying there is no way to ever know what is in those texts. They are expecting people to come forward and say things like “I deleted the texts, but now I remember who told me to.” Or “I really DID send most of them in, but I didn’t send in the encrypted ones on my personal phone. Here they are now.”
Some will keep stonewalling right up until they are presented with copies of their texts. Then they will start with disputing the content, “Fake evidence!” or “You have to prove intent!!!” Or, “I was just following procedure and orders of the head of the protection detail.” Or “Where is your chain of custody for this text, it’s inadmissible in court!” Or, when they really get it, “I plead the 5th.”
I talked to Matt Binder on his podcast Doomed last night. (Link. I start at 1:46.) I asked if he believed the texts were really deleted. He thought they were because of who was doing this and their technical sophistication. I laughed, I shouldn’t have, because he’s correct. The Secret Service DOES have that level of technical sophistication. What I was laughing about was how often people only look in their area of expertise and don’t consider others. *I’m guilty of the same bias. I know about the technical reasons it’s hard to delete texts everywhere AND I pointed out that other agencies, like the NSA, probably have copies. But then Glenn Kirschner pointed out I didn’t even need to go that far!
Cooperating witnesses have testified under oath about their texts
The J6 committee has interviewed over 1,000 witnesses–for over a year. Most of them cooperated. Cooperating witnesses turn over texts, from their private phones and messages sent on encrypted services.
Those who don’t take the deal to provide information will be sent to the DOJ, where they might cut deals to avoid prosecution there. Some will be charged with obstructing justice, others will have the charges dropped if they cooperate.
Jill-Wine Banks has pointed out that the J6 hearings are a public education process. Things happen in order for a reason. If the committee had just revealed the crimes shown in the texts, everyone would be focusing on that crime. Now we can add obstruction of justice to the sedition crimes. Thee public is learning about other people involved in ordering phones wiped, or the people who decided not to investigate wiped phones. Nobody knew the name of Tony Ornato or Inspector General Cuffari until recently. Cuffari might not have been in ANY planning or received of text messages about the coup, but now he might be charged with obstruction of justice.
The J6 committee is not playing 3 dimensional chess, they are just planning 3 moves ahead and anticipating the responses of their opponent. Prosecutors do this all the time.
What is frustrating for people is seeing a political party that fails to prepare for their opponents tricks, and and not using their excesses against them. I think the J6 committee has thought at least 2 steps ahead. What I can’t know now is if the DOJ and the Democrats will drop the ball on the 3rd step, which is pushing to prosecute people for their crimes. The “good” news is that as more people talk the Democrats can use that against the Insurrectionists, coup plotters & justice obstructors. And the pressure on the DOJ to publicly indict continues to mount.
They are predictable. Use their threats against them!
We know how TFG & his people act. They lie. They threaten anyone who challenges them. Politicians with primaries. Witnesses and whistleblowers with death threats. When someone does challenge them they’ll destroy the entire board rather than accept a loss. (Like how Charlie X melted the chess pieces at the end when he lost.)
We know how they act. Prepare for their witness tampering & death threats!
Prepare for them destroying the board! Catch them red handed!
There is a reason that the committee offered anonymity to the person talking about the calls that Pence’s Secret Service protection detail made to their loved ones. That person represents the people in the Multi-Agency Communications Center that has all the comms from that day heard in real time, like the Secret Service radio traffic that we saw coupled with the VP’s exit from the Capitol.
His comment “I don’t like to talk about it.” had two meanings. 1) It’s disturbing and 2) “If they find out it’s me, I’m a dead man. “
I know a lot about computer surveillance & security, corporate & political butt covering, how our political journalists & experts think and how the RW media drives RW victim narratives. But I’ll admit I’m not as knowledgeable about how the behind the scenes deal cutting works to get information. Or how deal cutting works at the DOJ to reduce penalties for certain crimes.
I’ve found that people often come at a problem from their area of expertise. I’d like to hear from OTHER kinds of experts too. Someone who can explain the political reasons no one mentions the NSA or other agencies, “This story is being used to avoid revealing the truth because a deal is being cut.” Or someone who will say,”The committee can’t say where they got the texts, it would reveal sources and methods.” Or “The committee doesn’t want to acknowledge that multiple friendly agencies and countries like Canada, Britain and Israel have copies. Also, unfriendly countries have copies too which they can use as blackmail.” That would set off Trump people screaming about the intelligence community being out to get them.
For a legal cases the DOJ might have to show they got the information from a different source than over the air monitoring . They might not want to mention and that the NSA can break all the encryptions of all the apps being used. (Remember how the British didn’t want the Germans to know they had cracked their code.)
(BTW, this process of covering up for the NSA signal intelligences is something that the NSA did with the DEA after they provided information about drug dealers. The DEA used the information the NSA gave them and then went back and find a legitimate source that they could use in a court of law. )
We need to think in multiple dimensions to understand why certain things happen, or don’t happen.
We are fighting people who break norms, rules and laws. They are willing to lie, cheat, steal, threaten to destroy others and our entire system to win.
If it was ISIS we’d know, but it’s Insiders, Proud Boys & Oath Keepers
Imagine ISIS had attacked congress on January 6th, attempted to hang the VP and kill the Speaker of the House. They didn’t succeed. We would expect our intelligence agencies to have ALL of ISIS’ communications, right? To pull it off ISIS had to have people in the Capitol Police, the Secret Service, DHS & DoD. Everyone in the country would expect the NSA to have a copy of ISIS’s communications with the insiders. One way to find the insiders is to look for who is covered their tracks.
To root out insiders you need cooperators and leverage. Evidence of obstruction is leverage.
I expect deals are being cut now to get more information. In the future the committee can reveal the content of the texts (or texts themselves) if necessary. The committee’s job is to gather information and tell the story of what happened. They are doing a good job. The DOJ’s job will be to prosecute the crimes revealed using admissible evidence. The committee doesn’t have to.
As we have heard over and over the committee wants to make sure this doesn’t happen again. Part of that is by changing the laws. But also, in a world were top lawbreakers are never punished, they have to expose all the cooperators on the way to the top. We are on the way. Yesterday Ex-White House counsel Pat Cipollone was subpoenaed by federal grand jury.