Trump’s Intelligence War Is Also an Election Story
With a loyalist as acting director of national intelligence, the official line on issues like Russian election meddling could bend closer to the president’s.
In The News Piece in The Atlantic
Official White House Photo by Joyce N. Boghosian
Feb. 26, 2020
Joshua Geltzer was quoted in The Atlantic discussing Trump's goal of throttling the intelligence community.
Joshua Geltzer, who was a senior national-security official in the Obama administration, told me that Grenell’s appointment fits with a purge in the executive branch, in which Trump, emboldened by his impeachment acquittal, is determined to install more loyalists. He noted that the U.S. intelligence community has been saying publicly for three years that Russia’s interference efforts are ongoing. “So it’s nothing new,” he said. “What’s new is, Trump believes that he’s at the point where he can strangle the executive branch to keep it from saying things he doesn’t like.”