Alarming chatter surrounds Trump loyalists being installed in top positions at the Pentagon in the waning days of the current administration, according to a Democratic congresswoman.
Rep. Chrissy Houlahan of Pennsylvania, a member of the Armed Services Committee, said on Wednesday that classified information regarding Russian interference, secrets which President Trump’s allies have sought under the belief they will reveal a conspiracy to undermine his ascendancy to the White House, are in jeopardy of being exposed.
This warning, which the former Air Force captain delivered in an MSNBC appearance along with former CIA Director John Brennan, follows a shakeup that began last week with the ouster of Defense Secretary Mark Esper and led to the entry of Ezra Cohen-Watnick, an aide to national security adviser Michael Flynn at the beginning of the administration, as acting undersecretary of defense for intelligence, Kash Patel, an ex-aide to former acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell and the House Intelligence Committee’s Devin Nunes, as the Pentagon chief of staff, and retired Brig. Gen. Anthony Tata as policy chief.
“I’m also as concerned about some of the other things I’ve been hearing, which are the possibilities that some of the classified material that is already in the sphere of conversations about interference, Russian interference, would be declassified in some way with these people who have been placed into the Defense Department in important positions,” Houlahan said after acknowledging speculation that acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller could initiate a military withdrawal from Afghanistan.
“That would create real vulnerabilities as well because it would expose our methods, it would expose our sources, which would also endanger lives,” she added.
Houlahan didn’t disclose the source of the chatter about classified information, though the group had been discussing a Washington Post report that described concerns among intelligence veterans that Trump might disclose secrets once out of office. The congresswoman also didn’t get into the specifics of what she feared might be disclosed.
Republicans and conservative pundits have long clamored for more transparency related to the Russia investigation, which ended in special counsel Robert Mueller not finding criminal conspiracy but ultimately has left a cloud over Trump and his inner circle. But progress has been slow, with Trump tweets about declassification that didn’t translate to orders, U.S. Attorney John Durham’s criminal inquiry into the Russia investigation that didn’t lead to any major revelations before the election, and limited disclosures by top officials, including Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe.
There is also mounting frustration on the Right with the lingering case against Flynn, which the Justice Department has moved to toss, but the presiding judge has so far resisted doing so. Flynn had pleaded guilty to lying to FBI agents about his conversations with a Russian envoy during the last presidential transition, though he now claims he didn’t lie, and leaks about those conversations, which ultimately led to his ouster from the White House, are believed by some to come from the Defense Department.
Top intelligence officials, including CIA Director Gina Haspel and NSA Director Paul Nakasone, have reportedly opposed the revelation of such secrets, but Brennan said he is “most concerned” about what Trump may do in the next couple months. Brennan also posited that the president might leave office with records that he could release at a later date.
“I share the concerns of the congresswoman, that could there be a wholesale release of classified information? And compromising sources and methods? And we know about Donald Trump’s very strange and obsequious relationship with Vladimir Putin,” he said. “Might he do something that is going to try to benefit him after he leaves the office of the presidency because of what his interests might be later on? It is a very, very concerning and worrisome development, and I know the people in the intelligence community right now are very concerned about it.”
The Pentagon shakeup began as it became increasingly clear former Vice President Joe Biden had won the 2020 election. Trump has yet to concede the race, pinning his hopes on legal challenges and recounts in key battleground states, but the mainstream consensus is he has roughly 70 days left in office before Biden takes over.
Brennan said if Trump does anything to threaten the national security interests of the United States, “it is incumbent on the next administration to take appropriate action against him or others.”
