(WASHINGTON) — An Oklahoma man admitted Wednesday to cyberstalking Rep. Kevin Hern, R-Okla., and threatening Hern and his wife, federal prosecutors announced.
Keith Charles Eisenberger, 39, of Bartlesville, pleaded guilty to three federal charges, including cyberstalking; threatening to kidnap and assault a member of Congress; and threatening to kidnap and assault the spouse of a member of Congress, the Justice Department said in a statement.
He was first charged in May.
“The U.S. Attorney’s Office and our law enforcement partners will not tolerate online threats of violence meant to intimidate elected officials or members of our community. Keith Eisenberger now understands there are legal repercussions to committing these criminal acts,” said U.S. Attorney Clint Johnson.
According to the Justice Department, Eisenberger admitted to prosecutors that he threatened and harassed Hern online from Nov. 27, 2018, to May 11, 2022, and ultimately threatened to assault and kidnap Hern to interfere with his official duties. He later threatened to kidnap and assault Hern’s wife.
Prosecutors said the concerning comments started in 2018 when Hern first assumed office and became increasingly violent as time went on. The threats were made during visits to Hern’s office in Washington and over the phone and social media.
During one visit to Hern’s office in 2019, Eisenberger told Capitol Police that he was angry because he thought Hern had been appointed to the seat without Eisenberger being considered for it, prosecutors said.
In a plea agreement, prosecutors and an attorney for Eisenberger agreed that sentencing guidelines call for 36 months in prison, the Justice Department said. He will then undergo 36 months of supervised release, according to the agreement.
Eisenberger’s guilty plea comes at a time of what law enforcement has called heightened concern over political violence.
A Seattle man was recently charged with felony stalking after allegedly yelling racial epithets outside the home of Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash.
Another man was arrested in June for allegedly threatening to kill Brett Kavanaugh while outside the Supreme Court justice’s home.
And in Ohio on Thursday, a suspected “domestic violent extremist” was fatally shot after attempting to break into an FBI office there, leading to an hours-long standoff.
(WASHINGTON) — The FBI executed an unprecedented raid on former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida on Monday in search of evidence reportedly tied to his alleged mishandling of government documents.
It’s believed to be the first search by the federal agency of the residence of a current or former U.S. president. Sources told ABC News that the raid was related to the 15 boxes of documents that Trump took to his Palm Beach home when he departed the White House — some of which the National Archives has said were marked classified.
Trump and other Republicans have sharply criticized the raid as a partisan attack and have demanded an explanation.
Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:
Aug 12, 7:07 AM EDT
Trump calls for ‘immediate release’ of search warrant
Former President Donald Trump is calling for “the immediate release” of the warrant that allowed FBI agents to search his Mar-a-Lago estate on Monday.
“Not only will I not oppose the release of documents related to the unAmerican, unwarranted, and unnecessary raid and break-in of my home in Palm Beach, Florida, Mar-a-Lago, I am going a step further by ENCOURAGING the immediate release of those documents, even though they have been drawn up by radical left Democrats and possible future political opponents, who have a strong and powerful vested interest in attacking me much as they have done for the last 6 years,” Trump said late Thursday in a post on his social media platform, Truth Social.
“This unprecedented political weaponization of law enforcement is inappropriate and highly unethical,” he added. “The world is watching as our Country is being brought to a new low, not only on our border, crime, economy, energy, national security, and so much more, but also with respect to our sacred elections!”
(WASHINGTON) — Multiple sources familiar with the investigation say the Justice Department and the FBI believed former President Donald Trump continued to keep sensitive classified documents that had national security implications and that in recent weeks additional information came in suggesting that Trump was not complying with requests to provide the information the Justice Department believed he had in his possession.
The information was sensitive enough that authorities wanted to take it back into possession immediately.
Additional sources tell ABC News part of the information investigators were looking for included material labeled “special access” which is material accessible only by the highest level security clearances only available to a specific limited number of individuals.
Multiple sources tell ABC News federal investigators have questioned many individuals close to the former president about these materials including some members of his current staff in addition to some former White House officials.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(WASHINGTON) — Congressional Republicans were quick to pan Merrick Garland’s Thursday remarks on the FBI search of Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago — calling the attorney general’s comments insufficient and insisting the Justice Department release more information behind the unprecedented raid even as Garland said he wants the search warrant unsealed.
But GOP lawmakers said the Justice Department’s motion to unseal parts of the warrant would not cut it, demanding that more information behind the search’s genesis was needed given the gravity of the operation at a former president’s home.
Sources previously told ABC News it was in connection to documents that Trump took with him when he departed Washington, including some records the National Archives said were marked classified.
“The primary reason the Attorney General and FBI are being pushed to disclose why the search was necessary is because of the deep mistrust of the FBI and DOJ when it comes to all things Trump,” tweeted South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, a close Trump ally.
“What I am looking for is the predicate for the search. Was the information provided to the judge sufficient and necessary to authorize a raid on the former president’s home within ninety days of the midterm election?” Graham wrote. “I am urging, actually insisting, the DOJ and the FBI lay their cards on the table as to why this course of action was necessary. Until that is done the suspicion will continue to mount.”
Other Republicans directly criticized Garland, who said at a brief press conference that he signed off on the search warrant for Trump’s residence in Palm Beach, Florida.
“Merrick Garland personally approved a search warrant to take down Joe Biden’s top political opponent. This is a politically-motivated witch hunt,” tweeted Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee.
“The FBI and DOJ became politicized under Obama and this has continued under Biden. The FBI has become an attack dog to help the Democrats achieve their own political ambitions and silence dissenters,” added Texas Sen. Ted Cruz.
Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene went even further.
“We must defund the FBI, dismantle the DOJ, and gut the agencies of political biases and persecutions,” she tweeted.
Meanwhile Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, perhaps the most visible anti-Trump Republican, wrote on Twitter: “I have been ashamed to hear members of my party attacking the integrity of the FBI agents involved with the recent Mar-a-Lago search. These are sickening comments that put the lives of patriotic public servants at risk.”
The reaction comes after days of GOP demands for Garland to release the warrant and explain the rationale behind the search.
Garland on Thursday said authorities acted by the book — and he indicated that carrying out his duties required seeking the warrant.
“Faithful adherence to the rule of law is the bedrock principle of the Justice Department and of our democracy. Upholding the rule of law means applying the law evenly without fear or favor,” he said. “Under my watch, that is precisely what the Justice Department is doing.”
“The search warrant was authorized by a federal court upon the required finding of probable cause,” he said. A court filing from the Justice Department shows it was signed by a judge on Friday.
Included in the government’s new motion to unseal parts of the warrant is a request to also unseal a redacted inventory of what was taken by agents at Mar-a-Lago.
Prosecutors wrote that Trump “should have an opportunity to respond to this Motion and lodge objections, including with regards to any ‘legitimate privacy interests’ or the potential for other ‘injury’ if these materials are made public.”
The judge in the case later ordered the government to consult with Trump’s attorneys and report back by Friday afternoon as to whether the former president would issue any objections.
People close to Trump have been discussing the possibility of challenging the motion to unseal the warrant, according to sources familiar with his thinking.
Lawyers who are said to be representing him in this matter are not responding to requests for comment.
Democrats, meanwhile, are pushing for the warrant’s release, suggesting the Justice Department’s motion shows there was no wrongdoing in the search.
“A reminder: Trump could have released this paper at any time. He refused,” New York Rep. Jerrold Nadler tweeted. “And now DOJ wants you to see it. AG Garland seems to have nothing to hide.”
ABC News’ Katherine Faulders contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — Career staff at the government’s watchdog for the Department of Homeland Security prepared a notice to Congress earlier this year about their difficulty obtaining Secret Service text messages connected to Jan. 6, but it was never included as part of the watchdog’s regular reporting requirement to lawmakers.
New documents reviewed by ABC News, and first obtained by the independent accountability group Project on Government Oversight, show the DHS Office of Inspector General (OIG)’s legal office went so far as approving a draft notice to Congress that was ultimately not included in the agency’s semi-annual report in June.
It’s unclear why the notice was not in the report. But the draft document details what the OIG said were “avoidable” roadblocks imposed on its work by DHS.
According to the notice, the DHS used a cumbersome approval process to release requested records to the OIG, which was “requiring [the office] to waste valuable time making inquiries.” And after delays of more than a month in some cases, documents would arrive with unexplained redactions.
Amid those described delays, according to the notice, the OIG said it was on Feb. 23 when the Secret Service notified the watchdog’s staff of the mobile phone data migration process in early 2021 “which wiped all data” — including the Jan. 6-related texts.
This contradicts another timeline: The watchdog’s office was aware as early as December that Secret Service texts from Jan. 6 had been erased, according to congressional committee members who received a Secret Service briefing on the subject last month.
It wasn’t until more than six months after the OIG allegedly knew about the deletions that it formally notified lawmakers, on July 13, according to Congress.
As ABC News previously reported, Democrats in Congress released new evidence last week alleging that nearly a year before notifying Congress, Inspector General Joseph Cuffari had abandoned his efforts to recover the Secret Service’s text messages from Jan. 6.
Democrats have called on Cuffari to step down, suggesting a cover-up related to the text message probe.
Sen. Gary Peters, Democratic chair of the Homeland Security Committee, on Wednesday requested a “full accounting” from Cuffari about the efforts to recover messages from the Secret Service and other DHS officials.
“These are serious allegations and diverge from the information that you previously provided me and my team,” Peters wrote.
“Therefore, I am requesting that you provide me with a complete accounting of actions planned and taken by your office and clarify the inconsistencies in what has been reported to date,” he wrote.
The DHS Office of Inspector General did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday.
Regarding the government watchdog’s Jan. 6 investigation more generally, their June report had noted “significant delays” with Secret Service records production.
“We continue to discuss this issue with Secret Service,” the brief statement said then.
Citing “the substantial public interest in this matter,” Garland said the government had filed a motion to unseal the warrant authorizing Monday’s search, which Trump has sharply criticized as a partisan attack.
The FBI operation was in relation to documents that Trump took with him when he departed Washington, including some records the National Archives said were marked classified, sources previously told ABC News.
Garland said Thursday that Trump’s attorney had been provided on Monday with a copy of both the warrant and a list of what was taken from Mar-a-Lago by the agents.
Garland did not discuss any specifics of law enforcement’s work.
“Faithful adherence to the rule of law is the bedrock principle of the Justice Department and of our democracy. Upholding the rule of law means applying the law evenly without fear or favor,” he said. “Under my watch, that is precisely what the Justice Department is doing.”
He said he “personally approved” the unprecedented decision to seek such a search warrant against a former president but stressed that “the department does not take such a decision lightly.”
“Where possible, it is standard practice to seek less intrusive means as an alternative to a search and to narrowly scope any search,” Garland said.
He acknowledged there was still much he could not say — given longstanding department policy not to comment on ongoing investigations that may unduly harm those caught in law enforcement’s wake before charges, if ever, are brought.
The search of Trump’s home marked a significant development in one of several legal issues that Trump faces. (He denies wrongdoing in each.)
“All Americans are rightly entitled to the even-handed application of the law, to due process of the law and to the presumption of innocence,” he said. “Much of our work is by necessity conducted out of the public eye. We do that to protect the constitutional rights of all Americans and to protect the integrity of our investigations.”
Finally, he said, he wanted to “address recent unfounded attacks on the professionalism of the FBI and Justice Department agents and prosecutors.”
The search of Mar-a-Lago drew a resounding chorus of criticism from Republicans and some others over what the detractors said was a lack of clarity about why such a move was necessary.
“The American people want transparency when you are raiding the home of a former president,” Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel said Wednesday. “The FBI is raiding the home of a former president. The American people deserve to know why.”
Speaking at a separate event Wednesday, FBI Director Christopher Wray said of the search, “I’m sure you can appreciate that’s not something I can talk about.”
As Trump has many times before, he and his allies have cast the investigation as a partisan sham. Trump said it was “not necessary or appropriate”; he has not released any information about the court-authorized search warrant, which he would have been provided.
The men and women of the FBI and the Justice Department are dedicated patriotic public servants, every day,” Garland said Thursday, noting that he would “not stand by silently when their integrity is unfairly attacked.”
“They protect the American people from violent crime, terrorism and other threats to their safety while safeguarding our civil rights,” Garland said. “They do so at great personal sacrifice and risk to themselves. I am honored to work alongside them.”
“This is all I can say right now,” Garland concluded, rebuffing questions from journalists in the room. “More information will be made available in the appropriate way and have the appropriate time.”
(NEW YORK) — Former President Donald Trump received a subpoena in the spring for documents related to what Trump is believed to have failed to turn over to federal investigators, sources familiar with the matter told ABC News.
It is not immediately clear what specifically the subpoena was seeking and whether Trump provided any documents in response to the subpoena, the sources said.
The subpoena came in the spring and played a role in a visit by federal investigators in June, the sources said.
CNN and The New York Times were first to report the information about the subpoena.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(NEW YORK) — Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate was searched by agents on Monday in relation, sources told ABC News, to documents that he took with him when he departed Washington, including some records the National Archives said were marked classified. (Both the FBI and Department of Justice have declined to comment.)
The operation marked a notable development in one of several legal challenges facing Trump, who has denied all wrongdoing.
During the annual Lincoln Dinner on Wednesday celebrating Iowa’s first-in-the-nation caucus status, Republican leaders repeatedly attacked the FBI — echoing and building on widespread outcry from the GOP.
At the dinner, Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel said potential action against the FBI or the Department of Justice relied on Republicans taking back control of Congress in the November midterms.
“There’s not much the committee can do. The best thing we can do is is win back the House and win back the Senate, and I do think the American people want transparency when you are raiding the home of a former president,” she said. “The FBI is raiding the home of a former president. The American people deserve to know why.”
McDaniel also argued that this week’s actions were “creating distrust in our institutions.”
“What piece of paper did he [Trump] take? I asked him the other day — I’m like, ‘Was it the Declaration of Independence or what did you take?’ I think this is really deeply troubling,” she said, suggesting the search was an overreach
Sources told ABC that the FBI had court authorization; Trump and his attorneys have not released any information about the search warrant, which they would have been provided.
Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley said at Wednesday’s dinner he “didn’t know enough” about the FBI operation to “say what’s legitimate to say or not” but compared it to the ongoing investigation of President Joe Biden’s son Hunter’s taxes and to a past probe of how Hillary Clinton also handled classified information. (Hunter has said he believes he will be cleared; Clinton was never charged with a crime.)
“When I had a conversation yesterday with the FBI director [Christopher Wray], I had a chance to discuss this with him, and I tried to point out: How come you did not negotiate something with the president, as you did with Hillary Clinton about her email?” Grassley said.
Grassley said he reached out Wray to ask for “some justification for what you’re doing” but the department didn’t respond, saying any comment would come from Attorney General Merrick Garland. At a separate event in Nebraska on Wednesday, Wray said only, “I’m sure you can appreciate that’s not something I can talk about.”
“We can’t have a two-tiered system of justice in America,” Grassley said at Wednesday’s dinner.
“We’re at a point where the culture and the credibility of the FBI is at stake,” he added. “We’re at a point where you ought to have upmost confidence in the No. 1 law enforcement agency in America. And I don’t think most of you do.”
In their own remarks, Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds and Rep. Randy Feenstra used the search at Mar-a-Lago to try and galvanize people ahead of the midterm elections.
“This administration has unleashed the DOJ, the FBI, on parents, on taxpayers, on gun owners and a former president of United States of America. We are at an all-time low folks,” Reynolds said. “Elections matter and we need to step up and we need to show up and we need to let them know that enough is enough and we are not going to take it any longer.”
“That’s why we’re here, because we are passionate about making sure that we save our country — save this greatest country that’s in the world. But each one of us has to do our part, including myself,” Feenstra said.
“So it’s my job to make sure that we fire [House Speaker Nancy] Pelosi … because then we can investigate Hunter Biden and then we can have hearings on all these other things that are happening, especially what happened to Trump just a few days ago,” Feenstra added.
Iowa Republicans started off the night with a prayer, saying “evil surrounds us” while attacking the DOJ and the “out of control” FBI.
“Lord, we know that we’re a tipping point in our country. … Lord, help us be vigilant in defending our religious and our personal freedoms,” said Steve Scheffler, a state party leader.
Republicans spent most of Wednesday’s Lincoln Dinner focusing their base on the midterm elections and also reaffirmed their commitment that Iowa will be the first state in the nation to choose a Republican presidential candidate during the 2024 cycle.
Their embrace of Iowa comes as Democrats are poised to remove the state from leading off their own nominating process.
“Most of all, it comes down to the grassroots and the investment from you and the serious nature in which you put in into selecting who Iowa will choose in your caucus, so I didn’t want to change it,” McDaniel said.
(NEW YORK) — Former President Donald Trump and his Republican allies are fundraising off Monday’s FBI raid of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate, providing another platform for Trump to capitalize financially on government investigations related to him.
Trump’s Save America PAC sent out a fundraising email Tuesday morning in which Trump urged supporters to “rush in a donation IMMEDIATELY to publicly stand with me against this NEVERENDING WITCH HUNT.”
Trump, in the email, cast the lawful search of his estate as an attack on all his supporters, saying the FBI raid “violated” not only his home but the “home of every patriotic American who I have been fighting for since that iconic moment I came down the Golden Escalators in 2015.”
“I need every single red-blooded American Patriot to step up during this time,” the email read.
Justice Department and FBI officials declined to comment on the raid, saying that they don’t discuss ongoing investigations.
Trump’s latest fundraising push comes amid what appears to be a gradual slowing down of his massive fundraising prowess, as Trump’s fundraising committees have been bringing in relatively smaller hauls over the past few months.
Last month, Trump’s Save America Joint Fundraising Committee reported raising just $17 million during the entire three-month period from April through June, including a little under $6 million for the Save America PAC itself. The amount represents a big drop from the hundreds of millions of dollars Trump’s team and the Republican Party raised together in the months following the 2020 election.
The Republican National Committee, which has continued to raise money in Trump’s name even though it no longer fundraises in conjunction with Trump’s PAC, also sought to raise funds off the FBI raid. It sent out an email with the subject line “BREAKING NEWS” to supporters late Monday night, just as the news about the raid was unfolding, saying that “This is UNPRECEDENTED.”
“We need YOU … to step up RIGHT NOW to stand with the GOP & STOP JOE BIDEN,” the email read.
Early Tuesday morning, RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel continued the fundraising appeal during an appearance on Fox News, where she urged supporters to donate to Trump-endorsed 2022 Senate candidates including Herschel Walker in Georgia, J.D. Vance in Ohio, Adam Laxalt in Nevada, and Dr. Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s campaign, meanwhile, was selling hats and T-shirts that say “Defund the FBI.”
“The FBI raid at Mar-a-Lago provides not just Trump, but the whole Republican base that affiliates with Trump, a significant but temporary boost in fundraising as well as an opportunity to propagandize for the upcoming election,” Craig Holman, a government affairs lobbyist at the Washington-based progressive watchdog group Public Citizen, told ABC News.
Holman said he expects the appeals to be “highly successful at first, but probably short-lived,” depending on what the FBI uncovered at Trump’s estate.
“At this point, the FBI is not saying anything, which allows Trump and his affiliates to scream the most extreme conspiracy messages for fundraising,” Holman said. “But once the FBI starts unveiling what it found hidden away in Mar-a-Lago — assuming that the FBI did in fact find incriminating records — the appeals will lose their legs.”
Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., who is leading the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, said he doesn’t know the details of the FBI raid but that it must have been based on a warrant approved by a judge.
“In any investigation, you follow the facts,” Thompson said. “I’m not certain as to the specifics of why the FBI did the raid on Mar-a-Lago, but as you know, a judge had to approve the affidavit for the warrant.”
Trump himself said Monday’s raid was just the latest “political targeting” against him and his supporters.
“The political persecution of President Donald J. Trump has been going on for years,” he said in a statement Monday night. “It just never ends.”
In the meantime, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who ran against Trump for the presidency in 2016, also appeared to be capitalizing on news of the raid. On Monday she tweeted out a donation link for her political organization, and promoted existing campaign merchandise like hats and T-shirts that read “But her emails.”
(WASHINGTON) — A new bill has been introduced in the House of Representatives three months after a nursing mom had ice packs intended to keep breast milk cold nearly confiscated by airport security.
The proposed legislation would amend the Bottles and Breastfeeding Equipment Screening Enhancement (BABES) Act to protect parents and caregivers by requiring the Transportation Security Administration to “clarify and regularly update guidance on handling breast milk, baby formula, and other related nutrition products” and the federal agency would have to develop and update the guidelines with direction from maternal health groups, according to a press release from California Rep. Katie Porter, who is sponsoring the bill.
The BABES Act was first signed into law by President Barack Obama on Dec. 16, 2016, and required TSA to notify airlines and security staff of the agency’s directives on traveling with baby formula, breast milk and juice on planes.
“TSA screening checkpoints should not pose a risk to Americans who just want to keep their babies healthy and fed,” Porter said in a statement. “I’m proud to introduce this bipartisan bill that will make it easier for parents with young kids to travel safely.”
Florida Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar, a co-sponsor of the bill, added in another statement, “It should not be difficult for traveling mothers to breastfeed or carry breast milk through TSA checkpoints. We can — and should — make motherhood easier through sensible measures like the BABES Enhancement Act.”
The pending expansion of the BABES Act was spurred by an incident involving Emily Calandrelli, the host of Netflix’s “Emily’s Wonder Lab” and a mom of two, who shared the challenges she experienced while flying for work in a now-viral Twitter thread from May. She had been trying to go through airport security when she said male TSA agents told her she couldn’t travel with ice packs that she had intended to use to preserve breast milk despite guidance listed on the TSA website.
Calandrelli told “Good Morning America” shortly after the incident that she had found the entire ordeal “embarrassing” and felt the agents had treated her like a “petulant child.”
Calandrelli’s story drew social media outrage and news coverage, prompting the TSA to release a statement on May 13 saying, in part, that the agency was “committed to ensuring that every traveler is treated respectfully and courteously at the checkpoint” and that it would “continue to engage with advocacy and community-based organizations to enhance our screening protocols” and “re-double our training to ensure our screening procedures are being consistently applied.”
After introducing the proposed bill amendment, Porter re-shared Calandrelli’s tweets and added in her own message, “Earlier this summer, my constituent Emily called out @TSA for failing parents traveling with breast milk. We worked together to draft bipartisan, bicameral legislation to better protect parents like her who just want to keep their babies fed. I proudly introduced our bill today.”
Calandrelli told “GMA” in a new statement that the proposed legislation she helped co-write felt like a “full circle moment.”
“I had a unique perspective because I had thousands of moms and parents reach out to me to detail their own issues they experienced with TSA while traveling with young kids and/or breastmilk and formula,” Calandrelli wrote in an emailed statement. “From those comments I was able to do a short analysis of what the most common issues were so that we could figure out what problems actually need to be addressed.”
“I’m excited that this bill will be helping all of those parents and families who reached out to me,” she continued. “Because of Representative Porter (and all of the other representatives who are supporting this bill), families will be able to travel [through] security a bit faster and with fewer issues — and I think we can all get excited about that!”
A similar version of the proposed House bill is expected to be introduced in the Senate as well, with Sens. Tammy Duckworth, of Illinois; Mazie Hirono, of Hawaii; and Steve Daines, of Montana, sponsoring it.
