Trump fires top federal cybersecurity official, GOP senators push back

President Trump ousted Christopher Krebs, the top U.S. cybersecurity official, on Tuesday evening, disagreeing with his statement affirming the security of the 2020 election.

Trump, who has refused to accept his loss to Democrat Joe Biden in the presidential election earlier this month, said on Twitter that Krebs had been terminated “effective immediately.”

Trump said a recent statement by the cyber chief about the election being secure was “highly inaccurate” and claimed, without evidence, that “there were massive improprieties and fraud — including dead people voting.”

“Poll Watchers not allowed into polling locations, ‘glitches’ in the voting machines which changed votes from Trump to Biden, late voting, and many more,” the president wrote.

“Therefore, effective immediately, Chris Krebs has been terminated as Director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.”

Krebs, a Trump appointee, had served as director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) at the Department of Homeland Security since the agency’s establishment in 2018. Krebs previously helmed CISA’s predecessor agency, the National Protection and Programs Directorate.