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A longtime Department of Homeland Security worker was punished earlier this year after she accidentally included a journalist in an email about an upcoming federal immigration operation, according to a report.
The unidentified employee told colleagues she inadvertently included the reporter from a conservative Washington-based newspaper on a January message, according to an NBC News report Thursday that cited former ICE chief of staff Jason Houser, a former DHS official and a current DHS official.
The email wasn’t classified, but still contained sensitive law enforcement information, including the time of the operation and possible homes that were targeted, the officials told NBC News.
When the staffer realized the screw up, she contacted the reporter, who agreed not to share the information, according to NBC News, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement operation went off without a hitch.
News of the error comes as cabinet members in the Trump administration face scrutiny and criticism after The Atlantic editor in chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, ended up on a private Signal chat discussing plans to attack Houthis terrorists.
Goldberg said national security advisor Mike Waltz placed him in the chat, in which Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth laid out a timeline for conducting strikes against Houthi targets in Yemen earlier this month.
While President Trump has defended his cabinet members tied to the snafu, the DHS employee was not as lucky.
She was placed on leave pending an investigation, officials told NBC News.
The unidentified employee was also notified last week that her security clearance would be pulled after she was asked to take a polygraph test and hand over her personal cell phone, which she declined, the officials reportedly said.
The staffer, who has worked in DHS since the George W. Bush presidency, has 30 days to appeal the clearance revocation, one official said. If she doesn’t get the clearance back, she cannot work for DHS, according to NBC News.
Houser, the ex-ICE chief of staff, vouched for the employee as someone who is “mission-focused” and “apolitical.”
“Targeting a career official who dedicated her service to protecting public safety and enforcing the law — while excusing political appointees who leaked sensitive war plans — shows this administration punishes integrity and protects recklessness,” Houser told NBC News.
“That doesn’t just betray her, it weakens every public servant who risks their career to do the right thing.”
DHS didn’t immediately return a request for comment.
