What evidence has been publicly released that links named Minnesota officials to Signal chat admin roles?
Executive summary
Public reporting claims screenshots and videos from an infiltrator on X (Cam Higby) identify specific Minnesota figures — including Amanda Koehler, Peggy Flanagan, Anita Smithson and others — as participants or administrators in neighborhood Signal chats that tracked and alerted about federal immigration agents, but those identity assertions have not been independently verified and there is no public official confirmation tying named state officers to admin roles [1] [2] [3].
1. Origin of the evidence: screenshots, an infiltrator and social posts
The core publicly released material driving the story are screenshots and videos shared on X by independent journalist Cam Higby, who reported joining and documenting multiple Signal groups and posted images that purport to show role labels, code names and organizational files for area-based chats in Minneapolis [2] [4]. Media summaries and amplification on social platforms reproduced Higby’s captures, with some outlets and accounts annotating the content to claim that certain named people appeared as “admins,” “dispatchers” or with specific code names in the leaked files [1] [5].
2. Which named officials have been linked in reporting, and how
Across the public reporting, several names recur: Amanda (Noelle) Koehler is repeatedly identified by Higby’s posts as an admin or coach figure — sometimes referenced by a code like “HAH” and described as a former Walz adviser in social media summaries — and Anne Kealing, an Assistant Minnesota Attorney General, is reported to have messaged the group and shared a work email in screenshots circulated online [6] [7]. Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan and Anita Smithson have also been named in viral posts and conservative commentary as alleged participants or coordinators, with outlets noting the claims but flagging a lack of independent verification [1] [3].
3. What the screenshots allegedly show about roles and structure
The screenshots and reporting describe a granular neighborhood structure — chats organized by area (e.g., “Southside RR Daily”), role emojis for dispatchers and patrols, daily-created chats deleted at night, and a searchable license‑plate database — details that suggest an organized operating model for rapid-response networks as described by activists and some leaked materials [4] [8]. Those operational descriptions are cited in multiple pieces as context for why someone in an admin role would have coordinating responsibilities [4] [8].
4. Independent verification and official confirmation are missing
Fact-checking outlets and mainstream outlets reproduced the social claims while emphasizing the absence of independent confirmation: several reports explicitly state the existence, membership lists and admin attributions could not be independently verified and that no official confirmation of a Signal group with named public officials has been produced in the public record cited here [1] [3]. Where screenshots show role labels or messages, public reporting so far stops short of cryptographically or procedurally verifying that the account names correspond to the real-world individuals alleged.
5. Competing narratives, partisan amplifiers and methodological limits
Partisan and fringe sites have amplified the alleged admin links with strong editorial framing and additional claims — including donor lists or “insurrection” language — while other reporting warns that undercover infiltration, screenshots and Signal’s ephemeral/archival behaviors complicate provenance and identity verification [9] [5] [6] [10]. Separately, reporting on FBI monitoring of activist Signal chats illustrates that encrypted-group content can be sensitive, subject to selective leaks, and interpreted differently by security agencies and civil‑liberties advocates, underscoring why independent corroboration matters [11] [12].
6. Bottom line: what the public record actually proves
The public record released and widely cited consists mainly of screenshots and videos from an infiltrator and social-media posts identifying named officials; those materials show alleged role labels and messages but have not been authenticated in a way that publicly confirms that the named Minnesota officials definitively served as admins in the Signal chats, and major fact-checking/coverage notes the lack of independent verification or official confirmation [1] [2] [3] [4] [7]. Observers should treat the leaked materials as claims supported by primary screenshots from a single public source rather than as conclusive proof of admins’ identities.