The Story:
Former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) John Owen Brennan jumped to the defense of his former U.S. intelligence colleague and highly decorated war veteran James R. Clapper, Jr., former Director of National Intelligence, in an interview following U.S. President Donald Trump’s stinging reference to the top former intelligence officials – including former Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) James Comey – as “political hacks.”
Brennan, in an interview with CNN, said:
“First of all, he was referring to us as political hacks because he was trying to de-legitimise the intelligence community assessment that was done.
Jim Clapper, James Comey and John Brennan did not write that assessment. It was written by the professional intelligence officers and law enforcement officers of this great country.
Secondly, I feel very honored to be associated with Jim Clapper and Jim Comey in the same category and, considering the source of the criticism, I consider that criticism a badge of honor.
And third, I found it particularly reprehensible that on Veterans Day Donald Trump would attack and impugn the integrity and the character of Jim Clapper.”
Important Because:
Trump has sought to confute the U.S. intelligence community’s conclusions that Russia, under Putin’s specific orders, meddled in the 2016 United States Presidential Election to favor Trump and discredit the Democratic Party candidate Hillary Clinton.
The situation has been further exacerbated after Trump claimed that Putin was “insulted” and irritated by repeated questions of Russian meddling in the election.
To make things worse, Trump also stated that he believed Putin was sincere when denying all allegations to the effect that he had orchestrated the Russian interference.
In the same interview, he also called the ex-Intel heads “political hacks.”
This Happened:
Clapper and Brennan were on with CNN in an interview subsequently published on YouTube, and Brennan in particular has made some scathing remarks about the president.
An excerpt from Brennan’s position on Trump’s inclusion of Clapper in the “political hacks” reference:
“To impugn the character of somebody like Jim Clapper on Veterans Day, who has dedicated so much of his life to this country, I just find that outrageous and something that, I think that Mr. Trump should be ashamed of. But it doesn’t seem as though, anything he does he feels any shame, whatsoever.”
See Brennan’s response to Trump’s charges on video:
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