Jan. 6 call logs show senior DOJ officials spoke with Pence, White House

Senior Trump-era Department of Justice (DOJ) officials made a flurry of calls on Jan. 6, including two calls between the acting attorney general and then-Vice President Mike Pence, and late afternoon calls from the White House main line, according to newly released call logs.

The logs, released as part of a public records suit filed by the group American Oversight, detail a frantic timeline of calls between DOJ officials and congressional leadership, law enforcement and military officials — with a call from the White House line not coming until shortly before 4 p.m. the day of the attack.

Handwritten notes from acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen indicate he spoke twice with Pence, though he does not list the times of the calls, making it unclear when they might have spoken or if it was as the attack was unfolding. He likewise lists calls with “SecDef et al.” and House and Senate leaders of both parties without specific times. 

The phone records include calls from several redacted numbers between 3:10 p.m. and 3:30 p.m., as rioters were walking through the Capitol and during the window in which an officer shot Ashli Babbitt as she attempted to get into the Speaker’s Lobby. 

Rosen also had multiple calls with former White House Counsel Pat Cipollone throughout the day, his deputy Richard Donoghue, and acting U.S. Attorney with the District of Columbia Michael Sherwin. He didn’t get a call directly from the White House until just after 4:30 p.m. 

The last person Rosen spoke with was Cipollone after 10:30 p.m. that night.

Donoghue’s call logs also indicate multiple calls to Cipollone as well as officials at the Department of Homeland Security. He received calls from the White House line at roughly 3:45 p.m. and 6 p.m.

The calls logs secured by American Oversight come the day after Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington released documents showing the DOJ weighed both a briefing with lawmakers and releasing a statement about the potential for “unrest” on Jan. 6, but didn’t follow through with either.