“Fear, anger and confusion have swept across federal agencies as workers grapple with a deluge of orders from President Donald Trump that they see as an effort to ‘scare’ them out of their jobs,” NBC News reports.

“In conversations with more than a dozen federal employees across multiple agencies, civil servants said the Trump administration’s rapid changes have turned their day-to-day operations into ‘chaos,’ with their immediate higher-ups unable to answer questions about their employment and duties. A number of these workers also expressed surprise at what they saw as an underwhelming response from Congress and their union.”

“A series of internal FBI emails released on Thursday showed that agents and officials followed standard procedure nearly three years ago when they opened the historic criminal investigation into Donald Trump’s attempts to stay in power after he lost the 2020 election,” the New York Times reports.

“The emails were released by the Senate Judiciary Committee in the middle of a contentious hearing for the nominee for F.B.I. director, Kash Patel, at which Republicans sought to paint the F.B.I. as a politicized agency that improperly went after targets like Mr. Trump.”

“But in fact, the emails showed that F.B.I. investigators took normal bureaucratic steps and precautions when opening the extraordinarily sensitive inquiry into Mr. Trump’s attempts to overturn the election using slates of electors pledged to him in states he had actually lost.”

“At least five senior FBI leaders who were promoted by former Director Christopher Wray have been notified they are being demoted or reassigned, extending a purge that began last week at the Justice Department across the street from the FBI headquarters,” CNN reports.

NPR: “While many people had no criminal record prior to committing crimes on Jan. 6, NPR has identified dozens of defendants with prior convictions or pending charges for crimes including rape, sexual abuse of a minor, domestic violence, manslaughter, production of child sexual abuse material and drug trafficking.”