The DOJ admitted yesterday that more than two dozen phones belonging to the top members of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s team were wiped clean of data before being handed over to the DOJ’s Inspector General.
How convenient.
The records show at least several dozen phones were wiped of information because of forgotten passcodes, irreparable screen damage, loss of the device, intentional deletion or other reasons -- and came before the DOJ’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) could review the devices.
The documents show that Mueller deputy Andrew Weissman "accidentally wiped" his phone twice after entering the wrong passcode too many times in March 2018. Lawyer James Quarles’ phone “wiped itself” without his intervention, the records say...
The records indicate Attorney Greg Andres phone was also wiped due to a forgotten passcode. And they say the phones of both Mueller deputy Kyle Freeny and Rush Atkinson were wiped accidentally after they entered the wrong passcode too many times.
The records say that a phone belonging to FBI lawyer Lisa Page – whose anti-Trump texts with FBI agent Peter Strzok were of interest to investigators -- was restored to factory settings when the inspector general’s office received it.
Other officials, whose names are redacted, claim to have unintentionally restored their phone to its factory settings, deleting all records of communication.
As the Federalist’s Kylee Zempel points out:
It seems unlikely that more than a dozen top Mueller officials all put their phones into airplane mode, locked them, and forgot the passwords or “accidentally” wiped their devices. Considering that the Russian collusion probe has revealed nothing but the depths of bureaucratic corruption and dishonesty and a shamelessly anti-Trump agenda from the start, the odds seem even lower.