A member of the Trump legal team who stirred outrage when he said Chris Krebs, the former Homeland Security Department cybersecurity chief, should be “taken out at dawn and shot” said he meant no harm.
Former U.S. Attorney Joe diGenova told the Washington Examiner on Tuesday that his comment about Krebs, who was fired by President Trump after stating that the 2020 election was the most secure in U.S. history, is being blown out of proportion.
“For anyone listening to the Howie Carr Show, it was obvious that my remarks were sarcastic and made in jest,” he said. “I, of course, wish Mr. Krebs no harm. This was hyperbole during political discourse.”
DiGenova faced online backlash on Monday for the comment he made on Newsmax in a discussion about Krebs’s recent 60 Minutes interview, during which he insisted that the election was secure, contrary to what Trump and his allies have claimed.
“Anybody who thinks that this election went well, like that idiot Krebs, that guy is a Class A moron,” diGenova began. “He should be drawn and quartered, taken out at dawn, and shot.”
On Tuesday, Krebs said his lawyers are considering legal action.
“It’s certainly more dangerous language, more dangerous behavior,” Krebs told Today host Savannah Guthrie on NBC. “And the way I look at it is that we are a nation of laws. And I plan to take advantage of those laws. I’ve got an exceptional team of lawyers that win in court, and I think they’re probably going to be busy. … They can know that there are things coming up.”
Krebs, who is a former top official at Microsoft, joined the Trump administration as senior counselor to the secretary of the DHS in March 2017, and he was later nominated and confirmed to be undersecretary for national protection and programs at the DHS.
The president has refused to concede the election, leaning on lawsuits in battleground states, which have been largely unsuccessful, and GOP state legislators, whom his legal team hope will select electors who would cast their Electoral College votes for the president because of a flawed popular vote that fell in President-elect Joe Biden’s favor.
