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1 (December 30, 2022)

handle is hein.comprint/jsctsi0001 and id is 1 raw text is: December 30, 2022 The Honorable Jonathan Meyer General Counsel U.S. Department of Homeland Security Washington, DC, 20528 Dear Mr. Meyer: The Select Committee has concluded its hearings, released its Report and will very soon be dissolved. The Committee has enormous respect for the Secret Service and its agents, and we write now to address the disposition of Committee interview transcripts for certain U.S. Secret Service personnel. At the outset of our investigation, the Committee recognized the legitimate longstanding limits the Secret Service has imposed on interviews or depositions of its agents. We also recognized the significant potential ramifications for the Secret Service's mission that would be caused by any detailed disclosure of the means employed by the Service in its protective operations. As our investigation progressed, it became clear that additional interviews of certain Secret Service agents and personnel would be necessary for multiple reasons. For example, our investigation uncovered substantial intelligence information, circulated by other agencies to the White House and Secret Service, that a number of President Trump's supporters had prepared in advance to engage in violent action on January 6th and were specifically targeting the U.S. Capitol. These documents suggested that those in the White House, including the President, Chief of Staff, and Deputy Chief of Staff, should have had more than sufficient information to cancel the President's January 6th Ellipse rally. The intelligence was also more than sufficient to warrant the cancellation of the President's plan to instruct his supporters to march to the Capitol. Likewise, Secret Service agents had important testimony regarding President Trump's desire to participate personally at the Capitol in the effort to overturn the election. Last summer, we were very disappointed to learn that text messages on many Secret Service phones had been deleted in the weeks after January 6th. This ultimately hindered certain aspects of our investigation. That said, after that discovery, you and your team stepped forward AUTHENTICATED u.s. GVRNMENT INFORMATION GPO