White House Security Official Fired After Insulting Tweets Calling Sarah Palin's Family 'White Trash'
A White House National Security Staff official was fired after it was discovered he posted on a fake Twitter account leaking internal information and insulting politicians, including a Tweet that called former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin's family "white trash."
Jofi Joseph's termination was first shared by The Daily Beast, which posted several of his controversial tweets under the handle @natsecwonk, which has since been deleted.
Some of his tweets included:
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"I'm a fan of Obama, but his continuing reliance and dependence upon a vacuous cipher like Valerie Jarrett concerns me."
"Was Huma Abedin wearing beer goggles the night she met Anthony Wiener? Almost as bad a pairing as Samantha Powers and Cass Sunstein ...."
"So when will someone do us the favor of getting rid of Sarah Palin and the rest of her white trash family? What utter useless garbage .... ," he posted last October.
Joseph, who has worked for Senators Bob Casey (D-Pa.) and Vice President Joe Biden, also criticized a number of White House policies and insulted his bosses, including former National Security Advisor Tom Donilon, Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes, Secretary of State John Kerry, and a number of other top officials.
The now-former National Security Staff official has admitted responsibility in an email to Politico, where he said that it has been a "privilege" to serve in the Administration and expressed his regret for "violating the trust and confidence placed in me."
"What started out as an intended parody account of DC culture developed over time into a series of inappropriate and mean-spirited comments. I bear complete responsibility for this affair and I sincerely apologize to everyone I insulted," he added.
Two administration officials have also confirmed that Joseph was behind @natsecwonk, and that the account was shut down two weeks ago. A number of members of the foreign policy community are said to have been shocked by the revelation, as Jospeh's wife, Carolyn Leddy, is a well-respected professional staffer on the Republican side of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
White House and State department officials had been searching for months for the person behind the Twitter account, on which Joseph repeatedly expressed doubts about the Obama administration's explanation of the Sept. 11, 2012 attack on a U.S. consulate in Benghazi that resulted in the death of the U.S. ambassador to Libya.
Joseph was eventually tracked down after more than 2,000 of his Tweets were parsed to look into his travel and shopping patterns.
