Washington: Chris Krebs, Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (Cisa) chief was terminated by Donald Trump for contradicting the US president’s claims of voter fraud.
Trump stated that he “terminated” Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (Cisa) chief Chris Krebs for his “highly inaccurate” comments on vote integrity, the BBC revealed.
Trump has refused to acknowledge his defeat in the US political election and has made unproven claims of “massive” voter fraud.
Election officials stated that the vote was the “most secure” in US history.
Krebs is the most recent official to be terminated by the US president after his defeat, with Defence Secretary Mark Esper was additionally shown the door in the midst of reports Trump doubted the Pentagon chief’ loyalty.
People are speculating in Washington DC that before Trump leaves office in January, CIA director Gina Haspel and FBI director Christopher Wray could also be up for the chopping block.
Like several others terminated by Trump, Krebs reportedly only learned he was out of a job when he came across the president’s tweet on Tuesday.
However, following his termination, the ex-Microsoft executive seemed to have no regrets.
He had operated the agency from its initiation two years prior in the aftermath of alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 political election.
To make preparations for potential cyber threats, Cisa works with state and local election officials and the private businesses that supply voting systems, while ballot tabulation and the power grid.
He had allegedly incurred the White House’s disapproval over a Cisa site called Rumor Control, which exposed election misinformation, a lot of it amplified by the president himself.
Hours before he was terminated, he posted a tweet that seemed to target Trump’s claim that voting machines in different states had changed ballots to Biden.
It was tweeted by Krebs that, “ICYMI: On allegations that election systems were manipulated, 59 election security experts all agree, ‘in every case of which we are aware, these claims either have been unsubstantiated or are technically incoherent.’ #Protect2020”.
This post, and others by Krebs going back to the end of July this year, seem to have been erased from his Twitter account.
He was among senior officials from the Department of Homeland Security who a week ago declared the November 3 US general political election the “most secure in American history”, while dismissing “unfounded claims”.
Although that statement didn’t name Trump, around the same time it was published, Krebs retweeted a Twitter post by an election law expert saying: “Please don’t retweet wild and baseless claims about voting machines, even if they’re made by the president.”
Krebs termination brought anger from Democrats. A representative for President-elect Joe Biden said, “Chris Krebs should be commended for his service in protecting our elections, not fired for telling the truth”.
