Questions abound over Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz's (D-FL) former IT aide Imran Awan and his abuse of his access to the House servers. Awan is accused of bank fraud, conspiracy, and exposing sensitive congressional intel. He was banned from using the House IT network in February following the discoveries and most Democratic lawmakers he had worked for fired him. Schultz, however, did not say goodbye until after his July arrest, when he was stopped by police trying to flee the country. She has since explained that she believed Awan had been the victim of religious profiling.
Republican lawmakers held a hearing on the case Tuesday on Capitol Hill.
Rep. Scott Perry (R-PA), a member of the Homeland Security subcommittee on cyber security, told his colleagues that Awan's actions "indicate a substantial security threat.” For instance, the House Office of Inspector General tracked Awan's network usage on House servers and found that a “massive” amount of data was flowing from the networks.
According to Perry, more than 5,700 logins by the five Awan associates were discovered on a single server within the House and 5,400 of those logins appeared unauthorized. That server, Perry said, belonged to then-Democratic Rep. Xavier Becerra, who is now attorney general in California.
Following a Capitol Police investigation, the findings suggested some more foul play.
The congressman said Capitol Police determined that an image they asked Imran to provide was falsified, believing it to be a “deliberate attempt to conceal the activities that they knew were against House policy and the law.”
Perry also discussed how Capitol Police recovered a bag with a laptop featuring Wasserman Shultz’s initials from a phone booth after midnight in the Rayburn building about two months after House investigators barred Awan and his coterie from access to House computer networks.
As Fox's James Rosen rightly notes, these discoveries put Schultz under scrutiny once again.
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