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- [00:00]
Lauren Anderson
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- [01:16]
Lauren Anderson
Today MSW Media. Spy Talk, a podcast at the intersection of intelligence, foreign policy, national security and military operations.
- [01:36]
Jeff Stein
Hi there. I'm Jeff Stein.
- [01:38]
Karen Greenberg
And I'm Karen Greenberg.
- [01:39]
Jeff Stein
Welcome to another edition of Spy Talk Podcast. Michael Isikov is off today on his way to China. He'll come back with some interesting stories for us, I'm sure. Anyway, we have a terrific guest today, Lauren Anderson, one of the most admired women to climb up the senior ranks of the US national security apparatus. Starting out as a junior FBI special agent, her demonstrated grit and determination won her a spot as the first woman on an FBI SWAT team. She was also, at one point, Deputy Director of National Intelligence, the National Security division. She's done so many other things, traveled the world with Robert Mueller, the FBI director. So we're really looking forward to that. We want to get to that as soon as possible, just very, very quickly. And we're going to talk about this with Lauren, of course. Cash Patel again back in the news. Why is he going to Moscow? You know the the FSB has got to be licking their chops looking for weaknesses in this guy. They've compiled a complete profile of him, of course, as his de rigor for any intelligence agency. But will they try to test his weakness for alcohol or his reported weakness for alcohol, I should quickly say which. He denies missing days, et cetera. Is he going to bring his girlfriend along?
- [03:08]
Karen Greenberg
Well, I think it's not just what's going to happen when he goes there. But why is he going now? Why actually is he going on the eve of an election? And you know, I don't want to sound conspiratorial about it, but the timing does seem to be a little. What does he hope to get out of it? I understand the worries about what the Russians might get out of it, but also what is the reason he's going? He says it's to work more closely together on issues such as cryptocurrency and other kinds of things. This is part of the larger story of reaching out to China and Russia and having some kind of alliance with them despite our differences in tensions. But the real question is not just
- [03:51]
Lauren Anderson
why, but why now and why would
- [03:54]
Jeff Stein
Trump allow this to happen? I mean, it can't be good publicity for him. It just dredges up all the old Russia, Russia, Russia stuff. So anyway, we're going to be talking to Laura about that. One thing else I wanted to address briefly, Cuba. It's been reported the CIA has, it's been leaked that the CIA is forming a Cuba task force to drill down on what they can do to bring down the Cuban regime. You know, Cuba's counterintelligence apparatus. Even, even John Ratcliffe, the head of the CIA has said, you know, you guys are pretty good. So I don't know where they're going with this. Trump seems to be pretty busy with Iran. He's tried another Venezuela operation.
- [04:40]
Karen Greenberg
You know, look, the, the, the National Security Strategy has talked about pivoting from elsewhere on the globe to this hemisphere. So if you're going to really talk about this hemisphere, in addition to ve Venezuela, in addition to the boat attacks in the Caribbean and elsewhere, the question of Cuba has been there repeatedly and what he really wants. Yeah, and forever and is a long part of the history between the two nations. What exactly is the United States and not just the United States, the CIA planning in terms of Cuba. So this is now our newest chapter. What it actually means other than a bunch of statements we don't actually know, but it is part of that larger sense of pivoting the mindset towards this hemisphere.
- [05:21]
Jeff Stein
Well, the analysis is, you know, not only do escalate collection what's going on and that will, you know, use CIA spies, cyber etc economic analysis. I mean it seems like it's a rotten fruit about to fall anyway because they don't have any oil, you know, which means they don't have buses, they don't have trucks, they can't get their food to the market, etc etc, etc. So they want to try to find collaborators in the government and etc. So we'll keep an eye on that. And finally, just quickly, German police have reported an explosive drone was found at a German airport right next to a Ukrainian carrier. I mean, the Russians are getting bolder and bolder with their combined hybrid operations across Europe. They seem to be probing for defenses in Germany. And this is, this is very worrisome. I mean, we're just seem to be sliding into maybe something much bigger than Ukraine. And I don't know that we're helping out much.
- [06:28]
Karen Greenberg
No. And this has always been the question, how is this going to expand? Where is it going to expand? Who's going to be at risk? They did detect the drone, explosive drone, and they did diffuse it. Right. So it tells you in some ways that prevention mechanisms are in place. But it's, it's very worrisome, as you say. And, and, and who knows where this could go.
- [06:52]
Jeff Stein
As if we didn't have enough problems. No, I mean, are we going to have a third world war with the Russians or, I mean, Russia, they're helping the Iranians, the Chinese are helping the Iranians. Not good. Anyway, we're going to bring on Lauren Anderson, who, among other wonderful things I've already said about her, she was the first woman to lead FBI offices in France and Africa, covering 22 countries on that continent, then led the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force in New York City. Two very big firsts today. She serves on many non profit boards working to make the world safer, better place, as well as on the U.S. government Comptroller General's Advisory board which oversees the work of the GAO Congress's watchdog agency. She's also a member of the Steady State, a group of some 400 former national security officials opposed to many of the Trump administration's foreign national security policies. And without further ado, let's get Lauren on the show. Lauren Anderson, welcome back to Spy Talk. Given your vast experience in intelligence and counterterrorism across several continents, we have much to talk about. But I have to start with Kash Patel and his relationships with China and Russia. He went to China in late July and he's planning to go to Moscow to meet with the FSB in October. What do you make of this?
- [08:23]
Lauren Anderson
Well, first of all, I agree with you. I think that the FSB is probably salivating at the opportunity to have him there, but I think to step back a little bit and look at the China trip that was not publicized ahead of time. So it's fascinating to me that they chose to kind of keep that on the down low. But the Russia trip has been way out in front and obviously creating a lot of conversation. I did hear the director interviewed last week, and he talked about the trip to China a little bit and said that, oh, you know, he was the first one to go in 11 years. And as a result of his trip, China is no longer going to be sending out fentanyl precursors, and this is going to put an end to all fentanyl trafficking. So I think that's a bit of a large claim. We've also had a presence there for more than two decades, both in Beijing and China. Those legal offices were set up a long time ago. So it's concerning to me that he's telling his version of events again, and it does not really reflect the depth of the relationship that's been in place for a very long time. And I know personally after 9 11, while I was working overseas, that the Chinese in that instance were really very good partners when it came to counterterrorism. And I don't look at the two countries the same way, as I know neither you nor Karen does. And I work counterintelligence against both targets. But to me, they're not in the same category at all, especially when we're talking about the FBI director visiting. So I have a lot of reservations about his trip to Russia. I think what troubles me more, and I think should trouble the American people more, is that Russia's at war in Ukraine and there's good information out there that's suggesting they're providing targeting information to Iran, where we are engaged in a hot war. And so to me, that is nowhere close to the same parallel as a quick trip in and out of Beijing. And I would put them in two separate categories for that reason, despite the fact that both countries remain adversaries of ours in a variety of different places.
- [10:33]
Jeff Stein
Let's try to put a bright side on this for just a moment. What positive outcome could there be from Kash Patel's trip to Moscow? Are there areas of law enforcement that they and us would actually have a fruitful collaboration on?
- [10:57]
Lauren Anderson
Yeah, absolutely. And that has been seen over time. And I think that's a really good point, because this shouldn't be all about negativity, because there are areas where we have collaborated very well with both Russia and China over time because there are things that are mutual interests that kind of, although you could argue nothing is outside geopolitics and the relationships, but there are still Things where we do have common ground.
- [11:20]
Jeff Stein
And I think Islamic terrorism, for example.
- [11:22]
Lauren Anderson
Exactly, Exactly. It's something that they face throughout the country, and that's a challenge for them. And certainly after the Boston marathon bombing in 2013, they were integral to providing information to the FBI to further that investigation. So I think it is important to note that, that there are areas like that where there can be and has been good cooperation between the two nations. So I generally think that an FBI director making a visit to a country, and I hosted Director Mueller multiple times in France and Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, those are always really important trips, because wherever you're sitting, whatever country that is, no matter what they think of the U.S. they love to have an FBI director come and visit because there's a certain. There's a cachet, there's an importance to that, and it's a recognition that they are partners when the FBI director chooses to make that trip. So I think that's an important point, not to be lost in the politics of the moment, because it does matter.
- [12:26]
Karen Greenberg
You know, one of the things, though, that Director Patel talked about was why he was going right. He did not mention any geopolitical issues such as war, counterterrorism. He mentioned things like fentanyl, narcotics writ large, child pornography and other child trafficking issues. He didn't mention the kinds of things that you would think would be pivotal and central to whatever conversations they might have. Do you think that's significant?
- [13:03]
Lauren Anderson
I think he's. Despite what I would say is not good judgment in some situations, I think when he puts these things out there, he does an effective job. But I think what it's missing, like, for example, when you talk about trafficking, a serious, serious issue for everyone, that everyone would like to see more collaboration and cooperation. There's no question about that. But what you have sitting on the side here with Russia is the thousands of Ukrainian children that they have kidnapped and that they are essentially re educating now by placing them in Russian homes. So I don't. I'm not sure how you have a healthy and robust conversation on working together on matters like trafficking when it's well documented that Russia has trafficked these children out of Ukraine into Russia. So to me, that's a. That's one that's just ripe for questioning.
- [13:57]
Jeff Stein
So really, yeah. A questionable plus on what Patel and the FBI might come away with on this trip. But let's go to the dark side for a moment. I want to quote to you something that Olga Lautman, who is a very close student of Russia, wrote the other day. Now, Imagine this trip from the eyes of the fsb, she wrote. By the time Patel lands in Moscow, the FSB will already have spent years building a file on him. His financial disclosures, media appearances, interviews, professional and personal relationships, travel, public statements, and countless other pieces of information will already have been collected, analyzed, and compiled into a detailed profile of Patel. But the trip gives Russian intelligence something that they cannot obtain from public records. The opportunity to see whether Patel matches the file, observe how he behaves in person, identify anything they may have missed, and determine whether an opportunity exists to obtain compromise or some other form of future leverage.
- [15:12]
Lauren Anderson
Yeah, Olga's great. I don't know her personally, but I follow her a lot, and we've had her on the Steady State Sentinel podcast. So I think she's absolutely right. You know, having worked against Russia and the Soviet Union before that for many years, there's. Everything she says is spot on. They've clearly collected all of this information. And what I hope is that there are still enough experienced counterintelligence agents who are in a position to properly brief the director and get him to where he needs to be and understands the fact that they will do everything they can, including trying to create a situation that would produce compromise. That's going to happen. I mean, it's just a fact. It's a given.
- [15:56]
Jeff Stein
The Russians love to have drinking bouts with vodka.
- [15:59]
Lauren Anderson
They do.
- [16:00]
Jeff Stein
And it has been pretty persuasively reported that Patel has a drinking problem. Of course, he denies us, but if he. If they think. I mean, that would be something the FSB would. Would test anyway because, you know, it's very traditional. The Russian officials, you know, welcome, you know, their counterparts with. With vodka.
- [16:24]
Lauren Anderson
Well, exactly. You're going to sit there and you're going to do shots, and that's just the way it is. He's also, I believe, scheduled to go to St. Petersburg. And that's like. Why are you going to St. Petersburg? Because when I know this myself from organizing and planning directors, travel during the course of my tenure, that where you choose to go, who you choose to see is, there's no surprise, is very, very carefully choreographed, is very carefully managed. And so I just.
- [16:58]
Jeff Stein
Do you have any guesses on. Have any guesses?
- [17:01]
Lauren Anderson
I just read somewhere that there's going to be some kind of conference going on in St. Petersburg that may have intelligence connections. I don't remember specifically. I read it about. I'd say 10 days ago in the context of not only what was behind his choice to go to Moscow now also before the election, but why St. Petersburg. So there was some information out there, I regret that I can't pull it up right now, that talked about some conference that might be taking place there that he would then attend. But it puts him in another situation, you know, for continuing assessment. And I just hope that with the hundreds of agents that have left, including a lot of very experienced counterintelligence agents, that he's being taken care of in the sense before he goes, so he's fully understanding what he's stepping into. Because it is not. We all know this. This is not like saying, okay, I'm going to go to Idaho and visit the sheriff there and do whatever. It's just not. It's not the same thing. So I would love. Hey, listen, I would love nothing more. Just like I want everybody to succeed that's elected into office whether I voted for them or not. It's in all of our interest to see them succeed. That's the bottom line.
- [18:14]
Karen Greenberg
Yeah. So I have a question. So you mentioned the election that this is coming before. Right. You know, in the run up to the midterm elections. So unpack that a little bit. What could be the consequences of that? What might be the, the, you know, intention of doing this? I mean, does it have something to do with the election directly? Is it just a diversion from things that are domestic, like what.
- [18:37]
Lauren Anderson
What.
- [18:37]
Karen Greenberg
What might be there?
- [18:40]
Lauren Anderson
That's a great question, Karen. I mean, that would. It's going to be speculative at best on my part, of course, because I don't know what's going on. But certainly if I were in the FBI now in a senior leadership role, I would counsel him not to make that trip until after the election because there's so much swirling around both false information and factual information about whether or not the process can be trusted. Now, I believe the process can. I have faith in the system that's in place here. But unfortunately, you have the President undermining it, and he's talking about the fact that you can't trust it. And to me, we know that Russia has tried to influence and interfere in the past. This is not a presidential year, so that's not what we're looking at. But it still concerns me a great deal from an optic standpoint, if nothing else. I just think it's a huge mistake in judgment to make that trip now. Why not go at the end of November, the election's over and done with. We've gotten through that. Because, frankly, I think there's also a risk. And you and I spoke about this a few minutes ago. Karen, that we don't know what could happen. We are hoping that we have no violence around these elections and that they're done in a way that is not intimidating anybody. But we don't know. And I just, I think it's a mistake and it just provides the Russia with more Russians with more opportunities. Because I don't have a personal high degree of confidence that he will handle himself well. And I'm not trying to take shots at him. I'm just saying that how we've seen him manage himself in overseas visits before, like going to New Zealand with a 3D gun. Okay, no guns in New Zealand. It just, to me, that was a judgment issue that anybody with a tiny bit of an experience would have said, do not give a gun. It was juvenile to New Zealand. Well, but see, this is what worries me because that, to me, is not reflective of healthy and good judgment. That takes into account who you're seeing and understanding who you're meeting with. And that's a big part of what the FBI historically has been able to do for anybody that travels as well as the CIA is explain, okay, here you're going. Here, here's you're going to meet. Here's the things you need to be concerned with. Here's the great things. Here's what you have to watch out for. But to me, with all the changes in personnel that have gone on, and as I know you're both aware, there's lawsuits contesting the process of the firing, but he's taken away the overwhelming majority of the people who could provide him the best information and the best guidance on how to do this trip if he insists on doing it.
- [21:21]
Karen Greenberg
So if he were not the director, if it were somebody else who had maybe come up through the ranks, who was really well known within the law enforcement, intelligence community and Russian expertise community, whatever, would you feel differently? Or in other words, is it really about Kash Patel or is it really about the FBI director going at this time? And I'm just sort of interested how you see those two things.
- [21:46]
Lauren Anderson
That's a great question. I don't think I would view it differently in the current context. Whether it was Christopher Wray, Bob Mueller, Louis Freeh. I just think the timing right now, given the fact that Russia's in a hot war with Ukraine, as I said earlier, we've got information suggesting they're providing targeting information to Iran to attack our military that enough would prevent, in my experience, would have prevented any FBI director from traveling. Now, China, very different story. I see no issue with that. Based on what we know at this point in time. But we're not in a hot war with China. China's not in a hot war with anybody else. And so it's that set of circumstances. And I would say that whether the director was Kash Patel or whether it was Bob Mueller.
- [22:34]
Karen Greenberg
Thank you.
- [22:35]
Jeff Stein
Can we assume that Kash Patel will be traveling with security agents who would be looking into all the hotel rooms for hidden bugs and cameras?
- [22:47]
Lauren Anderson
Yeah, exactly.
- [22:48]
Jeff Stein
And what would happen if they discovered it?
- [22:51]
Lauren Anderson
They're going to discover it because it's going to be there. Okay, so.
- [22:54]
Jeff Stein
And then what do they do?
- [22:56]
Lauren Anderson
Well, that's a very good question. I've been in that situation where I had director travel and I knew that where I was was being monitored. So the FBI historically has had a great team on the tech side of the house that always travels with the director that's capable of searching for any kind of surveillance that's in place. From a tech standpoint now, I'm sure I cannot imagine he would be staying anywhere but on a compound. I don't see him staying in a hotel. If he does, they got him. They got him 24 7, no matter what the FBI says, because they can't control that environment. And it's whether. When we can control the environment, like typically my experience was the director would stay with the ambassador at his or her residence.
- [23:42]
Jeff Stein
I want to talk about how he's been handling some of these FBI investigations, counterterrorism and so on. But we have to step away for
- [23:49]
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- [26:19]
Jeff Stein
Okay, we're back. One of the recurring patterns of behavior from the director is he seems to jump in to investigations prematurely and start naming suspects, as in the Brown University murder and more recently in this plot to disrupt the wrestling match at the or kickbox, whatever it was at the White House. He went forward with this. He, he publicized a sealed indictment. I mean, what's going on with that? Just in pet. It's just a character defect, that he's impetuous and he can't be stopped.
- [27:01]
Lauren Anderson
He himself has said that he believes in transparency. And he literally in this interview last week described his decision in the case of the UFC event. Well, you know, it was in the court papers and they were going to go to court, so it didn't matter. I was being transparent. But from a process standpoint, that's wrong. It was a sealed document. There are a whole lot of things that were wrong with his decision to do that. And head I done that, you know, is running the Joint Terrorism task force in New York. If I decided, hey, wow, I'm going to go out and let people know about this, they'd have had my head.
- [27:34]
Jeff Stein
I mean, the, the suspects can lawyer up very quickly before the FBI gets to them.
- [27:40]
Lauren Anderson
Well, and it can create discovery problems. It can create all manner of things that would impact the viability of the prosecution. And theoretically, and there's no evidence that's happening here, but by talking about a sealed court document, indictment, whatever it is, you risk being found in contempt by the courts. So there's another whole legal layer here apart from the process, and then added to the wisdom of choosing to make announcements that are precipitous. I'm all for transparency. I think we all are, but there's a time and a place, and prematurely making statements like that, it doesn't help the situation at all.
- [28:20]
Karen Greenberg
It makes you wonder. Getting back to an earlier point, you meant, you said, I hope he has good people around him when he's in Russia to advise him, to protect him, whatever. So it really makes you wonder who's picking who's around him and who's picking who's advising him. Because in this case, in the case of these court issues, he was not well advised. Any lawyer would have said the cases could get thrown out because of this. Right, so, so, so my question is really about, you know, sort of wonky, but about what's happened to the upper structures of the FBI. Right. And are there still people there that, that you know and trust and are professionals that, that really know how to advise well, to protect the country and,
- [29:04]
Lauren Anderson
and the director as an institution, I have a lot of trust in the men and women at the FBI and doing the right thing. However, in the current set of circumstances, he has a cadre of agents and former agents that he brought back that are providing all of his advice. He has literally gotten rid of, I think, all but two or three special agents in charge or assistant directors in charge across the entire United States. Now, there's always turnover, but not at that rate. And someone told me, I have no proof of this, so I'm going to caveat it that way, that he has a chart in his office about when he takes out one of these people. So his closest advisors now are people who tell him what he wants to hear. From what I have heard, I'm not in the room, and I want to be very clear about that. But the people that he's removed, including very good friends of mine that I have enormous respect for, that were running field offices and lost their jobs or told, get out or you're going to get fired. They're the people who would have stepped up and said, you know what? Not such a great idea. I get that you want to go, but let's talk about doing this at this other time, or let's put Russia on hold for now because of the war situation with Ukraine and the fact that we're at war in Iran right now with Israel. So my concern is that he's lost that group at that level because he fired everybody that was on what we call the seventh floor at FBI headquarters was all gone in his first six months. So he just got rid of all that institutional knowledge. And in fact, both the House and the Senate and both Republicans and Democrats have sent letters to the director specifically asking him in a monetary sense about his payments to people because he zeroed out and went into the negative on the incentive award fund because he was giving this little coterie of agents bonuses with every paycheck that amounted, I think like $8,000 each. And he literally overdrew the fund. And one of those letters have come from, as I said, bicameral and bipartisan. So he's rewarding these people with extra money that's putting their take home salary way over what the government cap is across the federal government. So he's literally paying these people and they're going to tell him what he wants to hear. I don't feel that he's getting the pushback based on what I'm hearing. I'm not in the room. I want to be clear about that. But that's my assessment.
- [31:32]
Jeff Stein
I hadn't heard that. That's very upsetting. As fascinating as this is in a kind of car wreck kind of way, I want to take you back to your earlier work in Africa, which was extensive. I read something about it. I hadn't seen it before. Some snippet about you on a murder investigation in where, Cabon or someplace.
- [31:54]
Lauren Anderson
Yep.
- [31:55]
Jeff Stein
What was just very quickly, what was that about? And why is the FBI investigating a murder in bomb?
- [32:01]
Lauren Anderson
Well, that's a great question. Because it was an American citizen who was U.S. peace Corps volunteer. And at that time things were so corrupt in the country that the US Ambassador said to the Gabonese government, if you do not cooperate with the reinvestigation alongside the FBI, we're going to pull the Peace Corps out of the country and you'll never have it back here again. So he put enormous pressure on them. And so that's why we were there, was to reinvestigate that alongside our Gabonese counterparts who were regrettably corrupt beyond belief. So, I mean, I've lived and worked in places run by complete authoritarian leaders and I know what that looks like, but that's what we were there for. It was an extraordinary experience. I was also. Maybe you want to, I don't know. Can I share an experience about being in Mali, in Niger, before everything blew up as it did.
- [32:55]
Jeff Stein
Sure. So we love a good story.
- [32:59]
Lauren Anderson
There you go. We started going there early 2000, mid 2002, I guess is my first trip. But on one of my trips to both Mali and Niger, and there we had had two Marine security guards badly wounded and a U.S. dOD contractor murdered. That's why we were there. Okay. So U.S. persons protected. And the ambassador said to me, the tourism minister wants to meet you on your next trip. And I said, the tourism minister? And he said, yes. And I said, do you know why? He said, no. Will you take the meeting? So I said, sure. So we go to meet with this guy. He turns out to be the rebel leader. I didn't know it at the time. He's one of the few Tuaregs in a high level in government after that last version of the civil war there. And what he wanted to convey to me, he knew full well it was FBI, was that, as he put it, there were foreigners starting to come in up in the north. They said, talk to me about that. What do you mean by foreigners? And essentially what he then described to me was people coming in that were agitating, and it was the beginning growth of Islamic extremism there. You had the Salafist groups all over North Africa, but by and large, things were pretty calm at that point in northern Mali and northern Niger, even given the border with Algeria. And that was his sole purpose, was to say to me, something's going on. So I wrote this all up. I went to the agency, I said, there's something up here. And they absolutely believe it. And my assessment, having been in the territory, that it's a ripe area for exploitation from Islamic extremism.
- [34:30]
Karen Greenberg
Did they respond in any. You know, the CIA did.
- [34:34]
Lauren Anderson
They re established a foothold where they had previously been covering everything out of West Africa. Out of Senegal, actually.
- [34:41]
Karen Greenberg
Yeah.
- [34:42]
Lauren Anderson
So they listened.
- [34:42]
Karen Greenberg
What year? What years are we talking?
- [34:44]
Lauren Anderson
2002, 2003, 2004.
- [34:48]
Karen Greenberg
Wow.
- [34:49]
Lauren Anderson
And the military, US military was there. So I had meetings with them and everything else, but they, you know, I was told that FBI headquarters at the time, no, you don't get it. The problems in the Middle East. And I said, no, unfortunately, you don't get it that this is where the next problem's going to be and we can't not pay attention. And it was less than a decade later that everything blew up. And we all know the current state things are in right now in the Sahel.
- [35:12]
Jeff Stein
I want to skip forward to today. There's a lot of debate going on about Al Qaeda in Africa. Whether it's as one writer put is it dead, you know, as a global terror organization, or is it reforming and getting ready for another big terrorism spectacular, or are they positioning themselves to carry out major attacks in the West? Do you have any thoughts about that?
- [35:38]
Lauren Anderson
It's interesting you bring that up because I just had a conversation with a colleague of mine up in Canada by the name of Phil Gursky, who I think you know, Jeff, who has a book that's about to come out on Islamic extremism 25 years since 9 11. And what he posits, based on tons of information out there, good scholarly research, good reporting on the ground, and I agree is that is it at the pitch that we've seen before? No, but they know our eye is not on the ball. And I think the greater risk right now to the United States is there's always a risk at the homeland. But I think our risks are far greater with Islamic extremism in Africa and elsewhere and the Iran war with their proxies outside the US and it's easy to forget what we all lived through in the 1980s with all of the attacks and 90s, all of the attacks that happened, the targeting, the kidnapping, the killing, the Hostage taking of U.S. citizens.
- [36:33]
Jeff Stein
Blowing up the U.S. embassies.
- [36:35]
Lauren Anderson
Exactly. Blowing up embassies. So you know, that's my concern, that's my, that I sit with, is that I think our greater risk right now is outside the United States to U.S. interests, U.S. persons, U.S. companies, multinationals. I see that risk as far greater outside the United States right now. And so for anything that goes on in Africa and other parts of the world, I don't see evidence. And that's all I'm going to put it. I don't see public evidence that this administration fully recognizes how substantial that threat is to our interest outside the United States and outside a specific theater of war.
- [37:15]
Karen Greenberg
If that were to be information that the United States government took seriously and wanted to look further into, what are the agencies that would take the lead?
- [37:26]
Lauren Anderson
So depending what it is. So you definitely have the FBI, you definitely have CIA, you would also have DIA through the Defense Intelligence Agency, through the Department of Defense, who as you both know, has out of shape positions assigned in US Embassies, typically at a colonel level, but that can vary from all branches of the military. So you would have all of those folks working together to a lesser extent, dhs, because they're focus really is on the homeland. They certainly got attach in those countries. I worked closely with a lot of them and they were great people. But I think in terms of a lead on that, it's going to be CIA, FBI, and the Defense Attach's office.
- [38:06]
Karen Greenberg
Yeah. Interesting.
- [38:08]
Lauren Anderson
And then add to that, you're sigint anything that's going to come in from nsa, any geoint, anything like that?
- [38:13]
Karen Greenberg
Yeah, got it.
- [38:14]
Jeff Stein
Do you assess that the institution, despite all these crazy things happening at the top of the FBI and the CIA, not to mention ODNI and chaos there, do you assess if these institutions still remain strong enough to function in terms of their essential responsibility to defend us, to anticipate adversary attacks on us, like going right down to attacks on our water control systems or infiltration of our water controls? And very, very worrisome. This is. The heavy suspicion is that it's the Iranians. But as you know, this. This kind of infiltration of our institutions and our banks, commercial companies and so on has been going on for years with the Chinese, North Koreans, Iranians, you name it. But our. Are our institutions, our security. Are they beyond redemption at this point? Can they still do their essential work despite all these shenanigans at the top?
- [39:28]
Lauren Anderson
I do think that to a great degree, certainly in some areas, that that capacity is still there. And I know younger people who are working with their heads down and staying focused on the job. That's certainly true. So when it comes to things like that, I have confidence. Where I have less confidence is when we're looking at the complexity and sophistication that comes along with complex counterterrorism and counterintelligence investigations. Because I think, as you both know and appreciate, it takes years to develop the expertise to really understand what's going on. So, for example, when Director Patel wiped out the Iranian squad in the Washington field office after coming back from Milan, stripping both agents and analysts and other tactical support, he took away some of the best eyes and ears. Because that office is one of the most expert offices when it comes. Not the only one, but one of the most expert offices in terms of understanding Iran, its proxies and everything that it does. And his response was, well, I have these new agents in Quantico I'll just backfill. But it doesn't work that way. You can't just backfill. You can backfill responses to a bank robbery. No question.
- [40:37]
Jeff Stein
In my own experience, in my brief, brilliant career as a case officer in Vietnam a thousand years ago, I felt very strongly that I didn't understand Vietnam until the day I was packing up and coming home. And I had spent a year before that studying the language. So, you know, it's been demonstrated again and again that we don't understand Iran very well. So, I mean, we have lots of expertise, but understanding them, and especially in this particular administration, seems to be funneled by Iranian negotiating tactics, which is to stall, cheat, move sideways. I mean, the. The Persians have been negotiating with people going back to the Greeks. Right. So they're deeply experienced in this. But I want to very swift before we go, I want to talk about the FBI's role in going after Antifa as if it was an organization. The FBI agents are sworn to uphold the Constitution, and I think they take that very seriously. Any thoughts about this Antifa initiative on the part of the government? They seem to want to criminalize legitimate political dissent.
- [41:57]
Lauren Anderson
First of all, I actually was involved with looking at people involved with Antifa, which is not a centralized organization, before I even left the FBI. So the ideology associated with what is called Antifa has been around for a very long time, and they were behind the Wall street protests. So. But the thing is, they're not, as we all know, they're not an organization. It's not something that you can say we're going after them. And what concerns me about this push for Antifa is that we're attaching labels to people that might not fit. Now, that horrific shooting that happened in Texas at the ICE facility where we had people killed, which was horrible by any stretch, but all of those people were charged. Well, at least some of them. I want to be careful with being part of Antifa, but I have seen nothing in any public records to show that there's anything connecting them to Antifa. But where that becomes relevant is if, of course, there's no domestic terrorism statutes here. But if you make certain ties to certain statutes on the books, what that will result in is much longer incarceration for somebody if they are convicted. So that's where that is. It also risks going after people just for freedom of speech. I can, you, me, Karen, we can say whatever we want as long as we're not threatening to kill someone. It's our right to say that. And I'm deeply concerned about that because I'm talking to people in there, and they're very, very uneasy with putting Antifa labels on people, putting domestic terrorism labels on people when there's zero evidence to suggest they are terrorists, providing material support to terrorists or members in a terrorist organization. So it's extremely troubling to me because we have political violence across the spectrum from left to right, and that still exists here. But to Focus so heavily on antifa is a mistake because it's not an organization. They'll never be able to prove in a court of law, based on what we know today, that it is an organized organization and try and apply those terrorist statutes, such as material support. I don't think it's going to ever happen.
- [44:11]
Karen Greenberg
Which is why Marco Rubio had that conference at the State Department which basically said antifa, whatever exists within all these other 65 countries, sort of reaching out, saying, do you recognize, recognize this? They've already designated four in European countries, four organizations to your point, because we don't have a domestic terrorism statute to be able to say, well, those people are Antifa. And somehow, God knows, they read their newspapers, whatever they went on their websites, they're now associated with these foreign terrorist organizations. So they are incrementally moving towards being able to get around the laws or the lack of laws as they now stand. Right.
- [44:52]
Jeff Stein
And if a statute is established, FBI agents who object to this policy is sort of handcuffed, aren't they?
- [45:01]
Lauren Anderson
They are. They are. Then that's the. That's the problem. And that's one of the things that was just highlighted in the amicus briefs that were filed with the court by the FBI Agents association, by Justice Connection. And I signed that amicus brief which is pointing out that you can't discipline people for doing something that they believe is wrong, and then if they do it, the next guy is going to punish them. So they're in between a rock and a hard place. And yes, the agents might lose their jobs, but it's the American public that's the real victim here. And that's my worry is because we continue to chip away at the rights that we enjoy as Americans to say what we think, believe what we think, and do what we want as long as there's no criminal activity or violence involved. And so it worries me greatly. I had a. I had some younger people reach out to me and just say, I don't know what to do. And we try and talk through it, and I say, figure out where your line is. What is that line that you're not going to cross? What is that action or that order to you that you're going to say, I can't do it, and you need to have a plan in place for when that happens.
- [46:10]
Jeff Stein
Yeah, these younger people, agents would say 10 years in, they're really between a rock and a hard place. They may very well have children ready to go to college or they're saving for college and so on. I Don't know how much the Beltway Bandits can absorb in terms of ex FBI agents looking for consulting work.
- [46:31]
Lauren Anderson
Well, because a lot of them are still not being hired, because I'm in touch with a lot of the folks that left, and they're not being hired. And one who's spoken publicly, so I feel safe in saying her name is Kayla Staff. And she had about five years. Five, six years on the job, was working cyber, you know, very good at it. But she just felt I'm being asked to do things that are compromising my ethics, and I can't do this. And, you know, she's starting to go into a new business. I want to give her her privacy, but there's so many people that they can't get jobs. There's just not enough jobs out there. And a lot of people that I know that were pushed out of the Bureau still don't have jobs. They're going out on their own. They're creating consulting. They're doing legal work, if they're lawyers, but a lot of them still don't have jobs. And some of them have been out of their jobs well over a year.
- [47:20]
Jeff Stein
You know, I. I've been friends with. For many years with a psychiatrist in Alexandria who has a large practice with intelligence community personnel. And I talked with him not long after these mass firings began, beginning of the administration. And he said, you know, the actuarial, actuarial certainty is that 1% of people who are fired or forced to resign or whatever will go over to the dark side, reach out to Chinese or Russian or some adversary spy service. And he said it's an actual. And he used this term again, it's an actuarial certainty that that percent will double to 2% when you have these mass firings. What do you think of that?
- [48:18]
Lauren Anderson
I think there's a real risk. I don't want to. I still have a lot of confidence in the people to do the right thing. But I find fascinating this most recent case that came out that you and I shared information about this crypto case with the FBI agent who was arrested and admitted it. It's fascinating to me in this context only, because in the words that he used, he was frustrated that the US Government wasn't going after what country we believe is Russia significantly enough on what they were doing in the cryptocurrency space. So it's fascinating. He's not your typical kind of spy, is he? Living in a. Is this kind of a tangential Robin Hood thing? I don't know. He broke he clearly broke the law. He admitted he broke the law. We'll see what happens during the legal process. But it was fascinating to me to read that his. That he was expressing frustration that we were not doing enough as it concerned Russia and some of the work they were doing in the cryptocurrency space. So I think it's a huge risk. The Chinese are superb at pretending they're somebody other than they're not. To me, the Russians are kind of like bulls in China shops. But the Chinese are so, so good at it. It's subtle. Whether it's LinkedIn, whether it's anywhere else, you might never see that it's China and it's China. That worries me.
- [49:34]
Jeff Stein
Yeah, a lot of false flag recruiting, for sure.
- [49:36]
Lauren Anderson
Exactly. That's what worries me.
- [49:38]
Karen Greenberg
Lauren, can I just ask you one question before we go, which is that we were talking about all these firings, cleaning house, cleaning out the top, and other people leaving. We also hear another story, which is that women are just summarily being dismissed across the board in government, whether it's in law enforcement, intelligence, national security writ large. Like you look at pictures, you know, with Trump with all of his policymakers behind him, and there's no women. Do you see these policies hitting women disproportionately or do you think in the context of the FBI and what you know, that it's really just like a stage summarily dismissal or that the policy against women is pretty profound in my opinion.
- [50:21]
Lauren Anderson
It's definitely profound against women and anybody with skin that's not white.
- [50:25]
Karen Greenberg
Yeah.
- [50:26]
Lauren Anderson
And I have seen it firsthand. You know, one of the people that was told to take a demotion or be pushed out the door with your retirement date as X date date is a woman who was running the FBI Salt Lake City office, who I've known since she was a probationary agent. May Sayed, enormously respected by everyone. She led cyber and counterintelligence programs for the FBI in Los Angeles, was running the Salt Lake field office, and was pushed out two weeks before Charlie Kirk was assassinated. May did not touch. Not that this is an excuse. May did not touch. January 6th. She did not touch anything having to do with Mar? A Lago. And yet she was told she's not a fit. She's a naturalized American from Pakistan. She's a woman and she's Muslim. And there is a pattern. Another terrific woman at headquarters. It's a whole bunch of people I know about, and there is no other reason. Okay. And it's across the government. I have friends who are recently out of the military. And we're seeing what's going on there with the sidelining and failure to promote women and people of color everywhere. So it's across the government. It's their effort, I think, to get away with. To get away from dei, but what they miss, and this came out in this interview last week with the director because one of these agents that interviewed him said, you know, we just need to get back to basics and not who somebody is. But it misses the point that who we are, we bring our life experiences to every situation and we make for any kind of stronger organization or business with people coming with all those different perspectives in life to make better decisions and further the mission. And that's what I think they're missing right now, is they're cutting away that ability to have that lens.
- [52:11]
Jeff Stein
You are a member of the Steady State, which is an organization of some 400, last count, some 400 former national security officials, operatives, agents, et cetera. Do you see your ranks swelling in recent months?
- [52:32]
Lauren Anderson
They have been. I was first invited in last September, so I knew generally about them, and Jim Lawler, who's a friend and colleague, invited me in. But we are getting more numbers and we're getting from more agencies. Initially it was predominantly CIA and State Department, but we're now getting an influx. We're getting more from the FBI, more from doj.
- [52:56]
Karen Greenberg
Great.
- [52:56]
Lauren Anderson
Somebody from the Veterans Affairs. We're getting nuclear regulatory people. I mean, it's great because it's building our base of knowledge and our ability to understand and explain things, which is what we're all about, is explaining it in writing. Explain it on the Steady State Sentinel podcast with other videos that we're doing. So, yeah, it is growing. I think it's going to continue to grow. There are a couple other organizations out there as well, doing similar things. But we stay away from policy. We stick strictly to, you know, adherence to the Constitution, the rule of law, and Democratic guardrails, and not advocating for policy, because we can all have different opinions on policy. But is it adhering to the law? Is it adhering to what is demanded from the Constitution? So, yeah, the ranks are growing. I think they're going to continue to grow. We're getting more and more military officers who were pushed out the door.
- [53:49]
Jeff Stein
I've been closely following, as has Karen, law enforcement and counterterrorism, counterintelligence, well, on my side for 40 years plus years. Of course, Karen couldn't possibly have done that.
- [54:00]
Karen Greenberg
It wasn't even alive. Yeah,
- [54:03]
Lauren Anderson
me either.
- [54:04]
Jeff Stein
She's Just a few years out of college anyway. This is unprecedented, isn't it?
- [54:11]
Karen Greenberg
Yeah.
- [54:12]
Jeff Stein
This is like a ball of fish in the ocean. You know how they ball up to defend themselves from predators. Do you know of any organization like this, a former FBI, CIA, State Department, etc. Etc.
- [54:28]
Karen Greenberg
Etc.
- [54:30]
Jeff Stein
You know, people banding together to, to say the we, we need to embrace the Constitution and, and law enforcement norms that these are all under threat. I've, I've never heard of an organization like this before. Yeah, we have the FBI Agents Association.
- [54:48]
Lauren Anderson
Right.
- [54:48]
Karen Greenberg
But not.
- [54:48]
Jeff Stein
It's more of a welfare organization. Right. Looking out for the rights of agents.
- [54:53]
Lauren Anderson
Correct. But you're right, I've never seen anything like it. And the fact that, that we are all in this and recognizing that we might span the political spectrum in terms of our own personal beliefs. We're all so united about doing the right thing. I've also, in my lifetime, so I've got 40 years kind of my FBI time and out also working at GAO as an advisor and army warfighter exercises. So I also have had that span. I've never seen anything like it. I never thought I would see the day that the Department of Justice or for formers felt they had to create an organization and provide support systems, including legal help, mental health, job counseling to FBI personnel and DOJ personnel. I would have never thought I would see that day. And yet that's what's happening. And there is a separate subset within the justice connection, which is the biggest organization out there for FBI agents. And those of us who can are doing everything we can to support them, share our networks. I've never seen anything like it. But the thing I love about it is that whatever interagency or different kinds of squabbles that we all know come up within the government, that's gone. You know, we're all working together with one common purpose. And it is not unusual to have a CIA analyst, you know, an FBI agent, a former USAID officer, all collaborating on one written essay from their respective lenses and about how important that they think this is. And to me that's the silver lining in this very unfortunate cloud we're living under right now is that it's brought all of us together. It's set aside some of the nonsense that sometimes happens in day to day jobs when you're in these agencies and we're all doing really good things for the right reason to make things better for the American people, for anybody who lives in this country, A spark of
- [56:48]
Jeff Stein
light in a gloomy atmosphere. You guys, you guys are sort of out there on the wire to defend the Constitution and the American way of life, I might say. So thanks so much for coming on the show, Lauren. Your expertise is invaluable and all I can say is right on, sister.
- [57:09]
Lauren Anderson
Thank you. Thanks for having me again. It's a pleasure and pleasure to be with you also, Karen.
- [57:14]
Karen Greenberg
Thanks, Lauren.
- [57:16]
Jeff Stein
And that's it for this week's Spy Talk. Be sure to check out our complete podcast archive on Apple or wherever you get your podcast. And if you haven't already, do Check out the SpyTalk Co news site on Substack where we offer steady diet of scoops and original analyses from the intersection of intelligence, foreign policy and military carry operations. Just Google Spy Talk and you'll quickly find your way there. This edition of the Spy Talk Podcast was smoothly produced as always by Kanai and expertly edited by Molly Hawkey for MSW Media. That's it. See you around. I'm Jeff Stein.
- [57:55]
Karen Greenberg
I'm Karen Greenberg.
- [57:57]
Jeff Stein
Thanks for listening.
- [57:58]
Lauren Anderson
For more original reporting and insights like this, subscribe to Spy Talk on Substack and follow us on Twitter talkspy. If you enjoyed our podcast, subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Msw media.
- [58:27]
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Jeff Stein
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