A lawsuit filed by the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington has triggered the release of a trove of text messages swapped by Department of Homeland Security agents on and around Jan. 6, 2021, revealing a behind-the-scenes look at how federal law enforcement officials and agents reacted to the Capitol riots. According to CREW, the messages show how the Federal Protective Service, an agency within Homeland Security, knew ahead of time that the Capitol might be imperiled. As pro-Trump protesters rallied in Washington, D.C. on the night of Jan. 5, top department official Randolph “Tex” Alles texted two colleagues that it was “not a good look, glad DC has strict gun control.” One of the other officials replied: “Yikes.” By the next morning, the text messages had taken on a more frantic tone, with one official asking for an estimate of crowd size being told there were “A LOT” of people. An agent who wrote early that afternoon that there were “1000s of people in the streets” was told to “do your best,” according to CREW. Other messages were disbelieving, with one official asking “you watching this shit” and adding “shit crazy.”
