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Friday, February 21, 2020

Changes Already Under Way At ODNI

According to The Hill--quoting the NYT--Acting DNI Grennell has already started ousting long time Intel Community officials:

President Trump's new acting director of national intelligence, Richard Grenell, has already made major changes at the agency, including ousting the No. 2 official. 
Former acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire and his deputy, Andrew Hallman, resigned on Friday. According to The New York Times, Grenell told Hallman, who has worked for national intelligence and the CIA for three decades, that his service was no longer needed. 
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R-N.C.) praised both Maguire and Hallman for their service after their resignations were announced. 

The Hill's account, Trump's new intel chief makes immediate changes, ousts top official, largely follows the longer NYT article. The NYT article is a concoction of facts and fake narrative put together by the usual suspects: Julian E. Barnes, Adam Goldman, Nicholas Fandos, David E. Sanger, and Maggie Haberman. I got a kick out of this attempted smear of Kash Patel--the third paragraph is precious:


The ouster of Mr. Hallman and exit of Mr. Maguire, who also oversaw the National Counterterrorism Center, allowed Mr. Grenell to install his own leadership team. 
One of his first hires was Kashyap Patel, a senior National Security Council staff member and former key aide to Representative Devin Nunes, Republican of California and the former chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. Mr. Patel will have a mandate to “clean house,” CBS News reported, citing a person close to the matter. 
Mr. Patel was best known as the lead author of a politically charged memo two years ago that accused F.B.I. and Justice Department leaders of abusing their surveillance powers to spy on a former Trump campaign adviser. The memo was widely criticized as misleading, though an inspector general later found other problems with aspects of the surveillance.
...
As acting director of national intelligence, Mr. Grenell has access to any secrets he may want to review. And he has requested access to information from the C.I.A. and other intelligence agencies, according to two people familiar with the matter.

Already demanding to see CIA and other agency docs? About time!

There's more where that came from. Here's a link to the full story:

Richard Grenell Begins Overhauling Intelligence Office, Prompting Fears of Partisanship
The new acting director of national intelligence also asked to see the facts underlying the finding that Russia is interfering in the 2020 election and favors President Trump’s re-election.

And this is interesting, too--from a November, 2019, article in the Washington Times, via Fool Nelson:

Now, the Washington Examiner has confirmed that the whistleblower continues to work within the U.S. intelligence community on Ukraine and related regional issues. Separately, the Washington Examiner has established that Eric Ciaramella, who was named by one outlet last week as the whistleblower, is now a deputy national intelligence officer for Russia and Eurasia on the National Intelligence Council, reporting to the director of national intelligence.

5 comments:

  1. Off topic.

    Barr, Wray, Maguire and others had an editorial about election security. A copy of the editorial was posted to our IC blogs. A commenter actually had the audacity to write something along the lines of "Wray, maybe. Barr, fugitabutit! Unprofessional.

    Then there are persistent posters obsessed with sharing white supremacy articles from the NYT, CNN and WaPo. Colin Flaherty, a writer on black violence is labelled as a white supremacist. He is, or was, a frequent American Thinker columnist. Colin talks about black on white violence. The Southern Poverty Law Center is quoted. It is triumphantly noted that 60% of violence against whites is from fellow whites. Gee, where does the other 40% come from?

    The ODNI blog had an article about racism as this is Black History Month. Among the recommended reads are that whites shouldn't ask blacks about their hair or touch it. Another was about white privilege and the third was about the devastating effects of white males on this country.

    I report this not to impugn blacks but to point out the hypocrisy of the "diversity and inclusion" crowd.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. "whites shouldn't ask blacks about their hair or touch it."

      That should be easy enuff.

      Delete
  2. Many leftist posters will use NYT or WaPo articles that slam President Trump to sneak in their anti-Trump violence.

    To me, it's borderline Hatch Act violation stuff. We (IC) are "further restricted" employees who have stricter prohibitions on our political behavior.

    It's downright annoying to me and childish behavior on their part.

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  3. Just in time for his reelection, Donald is hitting his stride and cleaning out the flotsam and jetsam at higher levels. In his next four years, it'll help. I'm not saying it's going to be a cure-all, but it should help mitigate the obstruction against his agenda.

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  4. "to sneak in their anti-Trump violence".
    Is this violence only rhetorical, or should we fear it to be aiming at spurring real violence, incl. at Deplorables?

    ReplyDelete