New details uncovered this week about the scandal surrounding the computer tech of former DNC Chair and current Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) will be very troubling to those wishing the story would go away.
According to a report from the Daily Caller, Imran Awan, the tech who was arrested for bank fraud, left a laptop in a small public room at the Rayburn House Office Building for U.S. Capitol Police to discover. This was the laptop that Wasserman Schultz threatened the chief of the Capitol Police over in a now infamous video from an exchange in May.
"If the member loses the equipment, says they lose the equipment, and it is found by the Capitol Police, it should be returned," Wasserman Schultz said in the very tense interaction with the police chief. He explained that it could not be returned if there was an ongoing criminal investigation.
"If the equipment belongs to the member, it has been lost, they say it has been lost, and it is identified as that member's, the Capitol Police is supposed to return it," she repeated.
With the laptop, other items were discovered, the Daily Caller reported, including "a Pakistani ID card, copies of Awan’s driver’s license and congressional ID badge, and letters to the U.S. attorney."
Awan was arrested in late July while apparently trying to flee the country. He was indicted in August on four counts, including bank fraud, and giving a false statement to authorities. His wife was also indicted as a co-defendant.
Awan and his wife worked for Wasserman Schultz as well as many other Democratic politicians as computer technology consultants, but tried to flee when they discovered they were the subject of an investigation into a possible cybersecurity threat.
Rather than fire Awan, Wasserman Schultz kept him on her office's payroll, fueling speculation that there's much more to the story than is currently known.
In August, a U.S. Marine, who rented Awan's home in Virginia and a key witness in the investigation, went public to contradict Wasserman Schultz's accusation that Awan was being targeted because of Islamophobia. Andre Taggart told the Daily Caller that he discovered destroyed computer hard drives that Awan abandoned when he tried to flee to Pakistan.
He cited media bias in their coverage of Awan's story as a reason for his public statements.
“Him, his wife, his brother, all working down there — there’s no way they could do this without help," he said, referring to Awan's family. "If we can drag Trump and his wingnuts through the mud for the Russia influence that they are having, then it’s only fair that we also expose this s**t."
Media critics have noted how little interest the mainstream media has shown in the story, while conservative outlets continue to document every development in search of more answers in the case.
