CIA chief warns Trump to watch his words
The outgoing Director of the Central Intelligence Agency John Brennan has warned Donald Trump to choose his words wisely, blasting the US president-elect for likening the intelligence community to Nazi Germany.
“What I do find outrageous is equating intelligence community with Nazi Germany,” Brennan told Fox News on Sunday, days after Trump blamed intelligence agencies for the release of unconfirmed reports about his ties with Russia.
The report, which surfaced on Tuesday, alleged that Moscow had obtained compromising personal and financial information about Trump.
Infuriated by the report, Trump went on a Twitter rant, saying that the intelligence community should be held into account for allowing “this fake news to 'leak.'”
“One last shot at me. Are we living in Nazi Germany?” his tweet read.
Brennan took offense at Trump’s analogy, advising the incoming president to avoid “spontaneity” and “understand” the impact of his words before uttering them.
“I do take great umbrage with that and there is no basis for Mr. Trump to point fingers at the intelligence community for leaking information that was already available publicly,” the spymaster said.
“Spontaneity is not something that protects national security interests," he argued. “And so therefore when he speaks or when he reacts, just make sure he understands that the implications and impact on the United States could be profound.”
The remarks further exposed the simmering tensions between the president-elect and the intelligence community.
Last week, Trump rejected the findings of a confidential intelligence report by the CIA, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the National Security Agency (NSA), which accused Russia of hacking Democratic Party emails to influence the US election.
The report claimed that Russian President Vladimir Putin “sought to help” Trump defeat his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton.
When he was questioned about the hacks in a press conference on Wednesday, Trump said not only Russia, but many other countries were hacking the US.
He also addressed the Russia dossier at the press briefing, saying the release of such details would amount to a “tremendous blot” on the record of the US intelligence community.
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