The Air Force has confirmed that it granted unauthorized access to the military records of seven Republican congressional candidates in 2022.
The Air Force made the admission in a letter to House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mike Rogers. R-Ala., and Chairman of the Oversight Committee James Comer, R-Ky., dated Friday.
In addition to the five Republicans known to be affected by the breach, the Air Force confirmed that data from GOP candidates JR Majewski and Robert “Eli” Bremer had also been accessed — bringing the total number of Republicans compromised to seven.
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Ohio Republican candidate for Congress JR Majewski leaves the Capitol Hill Club in Washington, DC (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
The other Republican candidates whose data has been released to the Democratic Party research bureau are Rep. Donald Bacon, Rep. Zachary Nunn, Kevin Dellicker, Jennifer-Ruth Green and Samuel Peters.
The company in question is Due Diligence Group, whose Abraham Payton was cited by the Air Force in letters to Peters and Dellicker as having “multiple requests” for their records.
Due Diligence Group received more than $110,000 from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) from January 2021 to December 2022, according to FEC records, though it is not known whether the campaign committee used or received these or other Due Diligence materials.
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The Air Force told Fox News, “There was no evidence of political motivation or malicious intent on the part of any employee.”
“During the two-year period covered by the timeline in your letter, AFPC received a total of 19,597 requests for data from military personnel. Immediately after we became aware of the inappropriate disclosure of data related to Mrs. Jennifer-Ruth Green’s data in October 2022, AFPC conducted a Personal Identifiable Information (PII) Breach Investigation as required by OMB’s policies and the Department of Defense (DoD).
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United States Air Force Department logo (AP Photo/Michael Sohn, File)
“AFPC also initiated a separate audit of all third-party requests (10,599) received between early 2021 and early 2023. That audit identified a total of 11 individuals whose military records had been released without proper authority.”
The Air Force said their discovery stemmed from an internal audit that began after the discovery that the military records of Republican Indiana House nominee Green had been improperly released. That data, which Politico reported on in October 2022, includes details of a sexual assault.
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The release of Green’s records prompted Rogers and Comer to send a letter to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin requesting information, including a list of congressional candidates’ records falsely released over the past two years and a list of punitive actions taken. have been taken against those responsible for the leak. .
Fox News’ Ronn Blitzer contributed to this report.
Timothy Nerozzi is a writer for Fox News Digital. You can follow him on Twitter @timothynerozzi and email him at timothy.nerozzi@fox.com