Former Rep. Trey Gowdy said the buzz on Capitol Hill is that President Trump was not angry with acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire before announcing his exit.
The South Carolina Republican cast doubt on reporting Thursday about how a classified briefing to the House Intelligence Committee last week, in which they were told Russia is interfering in the 2020 election to get Trump reelected, may have cost Maguire his job and his shot at taking on the spy chief role permanently.
“My sources on the Hill tell me he was not upset with Maguire, that this was a move that was coming anyway. He just happened to go with Ambassador Grenell instead of [Rep.] Chris Stewart and some other qualified candidates,” Gowdy said on Fox News.
The New York Times reported sources saying Shelby Pierson, an aide to Maguire, angered Trump by giving the classified briefing, which he feared could be used against him, after which the president “berated” Maguire. An NBC News report pinned Maguire’s ouster on this incident.
The president announced on Wednesday that Richard Grenell, the U.S. ambassador to Germany and a Trump ally, would replace Maguire as acting DNI.
Gowdy argued that Maguire, as an acting official, had a deadline coming up in March, and that the former congressman’s “buddies” told him that Maguire was already on his way out.
Gowdy conceded that Trump was likely unhappy but said he was sure that it was House Intelligence Committee Adam Schiff’s presence at the briefing that got him upset. A Washington Post cited sources who claimed Trump “erroneously believed” Pierson had given intelligence “exclusively” to Schiff, a California Democrat who has repeatedly insisted there was evidence of Russia collusion “in plain sight” and was a lead impeachment manager in the Senate trial against Trump.
“Why would you trust Adam Schiff for the 100th time? But my sources tell me that is not why he got rid of Maguire, and it was coming anyway,” he said.
