Sen. Rand Paul said White House “insiders” assured him former CIA Director John Brennan’s access to classified information has been cut after it was reported he still had his security clearance in spite of a presidential order.
In a tweet Wednesday, the Kentucky Republican said Brennan’s “need to know” clearance was indeed revoked by President Trump.
White House insiders assure me Brennan’s “need to know” clearance was revoked by the President, and that he no longer gets classified information.
— Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) June 12, 2019
Trump announced in August that Brennan’s security clearance was being stripped due to “erratic behavior” that disqualified him from having access to sensitive information. But a source told the New York Times last month that the White House never followed through with the complicated bureaucratic process of revocation.
A CIA representative declined to comment at the time, telling the Washington Examiner the agency does not discuss individual security clearances. The White House did not return a request for comment.
Although it was widely believed he had lost his clearance, Brennan has on occasion visited Capitol Hill to brief Democrats on national security matters. He has been an outspoken critic of Trump and his tendency to question the motives of members of the U.S. intelligence community.
Brennan recently said he hopes Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and CIA Director Gina Haspel will “stand up” to Trump’s “unprecedented act” of granting Attorney General William Barr “full and complete authority to declassify information” related to the origins of the federal investigation into possible ties between the Trump campaign and Russia.
A close ally of the president, Paul told CNN last week he hoped Trump would conduct a search to find out who may have defied his order last year. He said the “deep state,” in which federal or military officials defy a democratically elected government, was likely to blame.
