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- [00:01]
Commercial Narrator
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- [00:30]
Shane Harris
Warning the following ZipRecruiter radio spot you are about to hear is going to be filled with F words when you're hiring.
- [00:37]
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- [01:13]
Jeff Stein
Fantastic.
- [01:14]
Commercial Narrator
So whether you need to hire four, 40 or 400 people, get ready to meet first rate talent. Just go to ZipRecruiter.com Zip to try ZipRecruiter for free. Don't forget, that's ZipRecruiter.com finally, that's ZipRecruiter dot com Zip MSW Media. Spy Talk, a podcast at the intersection of intelligence, foreign policy, national security, and military operations.
- [01:50]
Jeff Stein
Hi there, I'm Jeff Stein, editor in chief of Spy Talk, with my colleagues Michael Isikoff and Karen Greenberg. Today we are welcoming an old friend to the the Podcast, Shane Harris, staff writer for the Atlantic, covering the national security waterfront. Shane previously was a distinguished reporter on national security and intelligence for the Washington Post, where he won a Pulitzer for reporting on the January 6 attack on the Capitol. He's also the author of two highly praised books, the Watchers and At War. I could go on and on about Shane's accomplishments, but I'll just invite listeners to look them up online. So welcome, Shane.
- [02:30]
Shane Harris
Hey Jeff, thanks for having me back.
- [02:32]
Jeff Stein
I'd like to start with a recent piece you wrote for the Atlantic. CIA officers can sense the threat from within. Tell us about it.
- [02:41]
Shane Harris
Yeah, so Every year, the CIA's analytic ombudsman, which is a mouthful, does a survey of the analysts at the agency to get a sense of how they feel about objectivity in their work, which is to say, you know, are the tasks that you are being given not politically motivated? Do they seem generated in the appropriate way? Is there a political thumb on the scale being put on your work, et cetera. And as might not surprise people this year, a lot of the analysts said we don't feel great about that objectivity and we do feel that there is inappropriate political influence being brought to bear on it. What was notable was that in the survey which was described to me, I should say, I've not read it myself, the level of concern about a lack of objectivity was up. And in the sort of open ended part of the survey where you could fill in and elaborate, kind of like you would do at your workplace, maybe when you're evaluating your bosses. Many people said they had concerns about Tulsi Gabbard, the former dni, and in particular this issue in which she fired, as your listeners will, will know, the heads of the National Intelligence Council, the vice, the chairman and the vice chair, after they resisted efforts by one of her deputies to rewrite an analysis on Venezuela in the way the administration wanted it for its political purposes. So again, not surprising. I think analysts read the news, they know what's going on elsewhere in the intelligence community and they flagged this as a number of things that they were worried about in the first year or so of the Trump administration.
- [04:16]
Jeff Stein
But let me ask you about this. In your headline or in the Atlantic, headline refers to specifically to CIA and how does this pressure work? We know about the ODNI and Chelsea Gabard firing the national, you know, senior analyst and so on. But what about over in Langley? Does this, should we infer that John Ratcliffe himself is putting pressure on analysts? Where, where's this coming from?
- [04:48]
Shane Harris
I don't know if we can infer specifically something about Ratcliffe per se, considering part of this was just a, you know, there were pointed, you know, comments made about Gabbard, which I'll speak to in a second. But the overall climate is also what these analysts are being asked to speak to. And I, I have to imagine that they are deeply concerned about it in their own agency as well. I mean, Ratcliffe has put out tendentious analysis about election interference in the 2016 Russia assessment. I mean, nothing quite, I think, egregious as what Gabard was doing, but he's done a little bit of that himself and is obviously quite politically aligned with the President. But, you know, it's also that it's, you know, CIA is providing some of the analysis that goes into things that the National Intelligence Council, the nic, is producing over at dni. So some of their analysis, I think we can say would, is being kind of encompassed in the politicization that's going on at the DNI that they see. So I think that's another way to read it.
- [05:50]
Michael Isikoff
Although, you know, Shane, totally agree with you about the blatant politicization we saw under Gabbard at odni. But it seems to me, at least on some of the high profile issues the CIA has provided intelligence that was not welcome at the White House. We know from Regime Change, the book by Maggie Habermer and Jonathan Swan, that Radcliffe told the President that the idea that bombing Iran this time around would lead to regime change there was farcical. There's been a pretty steady stream of stories about intelligence analyses contradicting some of White House statements about the Iran war. So I'm just wondering, I mean, do you think that this was mostly a reflection of the overall climate set at ODNI rather than particular to pressure on CIA analysts to change their assessments?
- [06:58]
Shane Harris
I do. And you're right to say that that Mike, that, you know, Rackliff has, to my knowledge, not been firing analysts because they're saying things like, you know, the Iran well is not rom war is not going well. You know, I, I think that though, that interest in some of my reporting, there's a kind of plummeting morale also at the agency, in part because I think that they remember the early days of the first Trump administration when they were getting rid of probationary employees. They have seen people leaving in large numbers. I mean, very senior analysts who are leaving because they think that they're not happy about how the agency's being run. But like, in the aggregate, I think you're right to point out that, like this survey is capturing, I think, much more frustration and alarm about the way that Tulsi Gabbard was running the DNI versus the way that John Ratcliffe is running the CIA.
- [07:51]
Karen Greenberg
Can I ask a question, Shane? Just about Were you surprised that there was anything produced that reflected some kind of critique and criticism of the way ODNI was going about its business? I mean, basically there's been a silencing of the inspector generals. Right. Inspectors general. There's been sort of a sense that nobody should say anything wrong without fear of losing their job or worse, being investigated. So were you surprised? How did this actually happen.
- [08:23]
Shane Harris
Yeah, a bit. I mean, it's the. The survey is something that the ombudsman does annually. It's required by law. You're not required as an analyst to participate in it, however.
- [08:31]
Karen Greenberg
Yeah.
- [08:32]
Shane Harris
And a number of former analysts, after I published the story, wrote to say, you know, if. If people were feeling more positive about their jobs right now, I mean, you would have seen a higher turnout or a higher participation rate in the survey. In other words, what they were saying was that they wondered if even the people who took the survey might fear that there would be some kind of retaliation. My understanding is it's supposed to be anonymous, but that also people don't really believe it. It probably is. No, that's the thing, you know, and even. It's interesting, even Ratcliffe said in his test, in his confirmation hearing back at the beginning of the term, that the participation rates in the past had not been as high as he would like in the surveys. So, you know, we're seeing perhaps a vocal minority of people, but it doesn't. I mean, just from my own reporting and everything we've seen, I don't think that these people. There may be a minority of this population of the analysts who participated, but I doubt that it's a minority point of view or opinion contributing to
- [09:35]
Jeff Stein
declining morale or bad morale or whatever we think it is going on over there. Has to be the report we've seen that the administration has asked for a master list of all FBI and CIA assets and targets. Can you shed any light on that for us? Shane?
- [09:54]
Shane Harris
I can't imagine why anybody would want to create a master list like this. I mean, it just seems kind of preposterous to me. Like, it's a huge security risk in and of itself. Totally. You know, this is one of those decisions where when I read about that, and I don't have any independent reporting on it, like, why in the world would you want that if. Except for some kind of.
- [10:16]
Jeff Stein
Not nefarious. Nefarious reasons.
- [10:20]
Shane Harris
You know what I mean? Yeah. And hopefully, you know, this would be something that John Ratcliffe would be persuaded to resist if he were not already saying is a bad idea. But, no, I mean, I thought that that was just nuts, frankly. I mean, the idea that you would. And how would you even go about doing that is another question I had, too. It's like some of these assets are so compartmented and hived off that, I mean, it's not like, what do you do, like, go around, like, with a. And ask for a poll. Everybody, please report in the name of your secret agent that's working in Belarus or whatever, it's. It just seemed really strange or targets
- [10:55]
Jeff Stein
of FBI investigations was another part of that request.
- [10:58]
Shane Harris
I'm sure Cash Patel would love to know that information, you know, for all kinds of reasons that he might use to his own advantage.
- [11:04]
Michael Isikoff
Well, especially that we now know that Cash Patel is going to be paying a trip to Moscow in coming months, which kind of, yes, surprise some of us, I don't think.
- [11:13]
Shane Harris
You know, that robust law enforcement cooperation that goes on between the United States and Russia we're all so proud of.
- [11:20]
Michael Isikoff
Right, right.
- [11:20]
Jeff Stein
You know, there was the rosy days. You remember back? Well, I don't know if we remember, but back in the 1990s, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, we, the Clinton administration sort of rushed into this partnership with Russia on law enforcement issues, and particularly terrorism, and it turned out to be a mirage that the remnants of the KGB were not in any way going to.
- [11:44]
Michael Isikoff
I believe the last FBI director to go to Moscow was Robert Mueller, who, as described to me by one of those who accompanied him, you know, very much enjoyed shots of whiskey with KGB or fsb. Not vodka parts vodka, I'm sure. But let's. Can we talk a little more about ODNI and state of play there? Very bewildering on many levels. Now, you wrote a very interesting piece right after Bill Pulte became acting director, pointing out that under the statute, he had no business being a director of ODNI because it requires extensive national security intelligence experience. Jay Clayton, who now seems to be on board to get confirmed as the new permanent director, doesn't exactly have a lot either. Does he qualify under the statute, in your view?
- [12:49]
Shane Harris
It's a good question. I've thought a lot about this, and it's like the statute does say extensive. I don't know whether his relatively short tenure as the U.S. attorney for the Southern District in New York qualifies as extensive. It does qualify as covering national security. He's dealt with issues related to terrorism cases, I think, and those things would have come across his desk. And obviously, SDNY is a big district for that. You know, running the sec, I suppose, gives you large organizational experience. But, like, at this point. Right. It's just, I think what Trump is saying to the Senate, basically, it's like, look, you can have Bill Pulte or you can have Jay Clayton. Take your pick. Obviously, they want Clayton.
- [13:28]
Jeff Stein
Let's talk about the. I mean, he's not qualified by the law. It's not like we would like to have someone with extensive national security experience. That's the requirement of the law. So he's not really qualified. But let's talk about the rush to get him into that job. There are one is to get rid of Bill Pulte, but other the other shadow in this affair is the rush to reinvigorate Section 702, the surveillance law. Talk to us about that.
- [14:02]
Shane Harris
Right. So this is 702. Is this part of the amended FISA act that lets the government get these very broad certifications to go out and conduct foreign intelligence gathering, signals intelligence, and, you know, what intelligence officials will tell you is, you know, 702 is this vital tool. It provides the bulk of the information for the president's pdb. Right. It's this superlative tool. Well, it has expired and the debate to renew the statute has stalled because, among other things, the president wants to pass this thing called the Save America act, which would require that you prove your citizenship before you can register to vote. That has no chance in the Senate. But he's tied all of this up with the nomination of the next dni, and for a while, he actually pulled Bill Pulte back and asked him not to testify on the Hill.
- [14:52]
Michael Isikoff
Jay Clayton.
- [14:53]
Shane Harris
Sorry. Jay Clayton, right. That's right. Thanks, Mike. So, you know, we're now in this world in which law that Republicans and Democrats for years have told us, like, you know, if it expires for one minute we'll be blind, you know, in cyberspace, I mean, how many weeks and counting. Now, we're not blind because there is an existing certification that's running past the expiration date. Now, if the government wants to go author, get new authorizations for surveillance. And I've talked to lawyers who work as before and said it's not clear we can really do that. And the companies who get served with these demands might say, hey, you know, I'm not touching anything because the law says this is expired. So that's all happening, like against the backdrop of this drama with dni. And it kind of feels to me like what the administration is doing there is they're trying to put a gun to the head of the Senate and, you know, into Congress and say, you know, pass the Save America act, which is not going to happen.
- [15:52]
Karen Greenberg
Wait, are you saying that you. Because there's a debate over whether it is authorized or not. Right? Because the FISA court has authorized the policies that will govern until spring of next year, right. Spring of 2027. Is the program stopped or is the program going on?
- [16:10]
Shane Harris
My first it's going on. And I talked at length about this recently with a former administration person who knows this stuff, Cole. And what she was saying was like, look, it's still going on, but if the government came and said we need a new authorization for some new set of targets potentially underneath.
- [16:27]
Karen Greenberg
Correct.
- [16:27]
Shane Harris
That we, then we have a problem. But it's this very strange, kind of like, murky. I feel like when I talk to people, even the lawyers are kind of like, well, maybe this, maybe that. And it sort of annoys me because as a reporter, I can remember and then just getting hammered. Not me personally, but like, you know, listening to, you know, administration officials in both Democrat and Republican forever saying, you know, like, my God, if this law ever expired, you know, it would be the worst thing in the world. And, well, I mean, we're going on. I mean, I'm not saying that's great, but we're, we are moving forward and I suspect it.
- [17:02]
Karen Greenberg
Well, but you.
- [17:03]
Shane Harris
At the last minute.
- [17:04]
Karen Greenberg
So is there anybody who's reporting on or do you know if there's been any exchanges between the government and private, you know, Internet companies saying, we're not going to give you this information because the laws expired. Do you know if this conversation is happening or what?
- [17:19]
Shane Harris
I do not. But the last time in Biden, the Biden administration, when this went down to the wire, there were people in the administration saying that we are hearing from providers who are saying we may not comply if the law expires.
- [17:33]
Jeff Stein
We have this developing story about the Justice Department going after New York Times reporters. And I think I've seen reporting that they've requested from Google Communications that the reporters and their mothers and wives, communications from Google. I'm not sure where that stands at this time.
- [18:01]
Karen Greenberg
Yeah.
- [18:01]
Jeff Stein
So the, the last relevant here.
- [18:04]
Shane Harris
Well, not necessarily, necessarily the 702, because these would be domestic individuals and not foreign persons. But, but I think that what's happening with the New York Times subpoenas, I mean, it's outrageous. I mean, whatever, whatever is above outrageous is where my outrageous meter is right now.
- [18:19]
Jeff Stein
Very outra.
- [18:21]
Shane Harris
Very, very outrageous. The most outrageous anyone's ever seen. I mean, it's like, look, I mean, on the one hand, these reporters, all of whom, by the way, I'm proud to say, are friends of mine, they've been competitors and sometimes co workers over the year, report on this story that Trump has to fly back from Ankara from the NATO summit on the old clunky Air Force One that he doesn't like and he can't fly his big pretty Qatar Jet because the thing doesn't have security measures installed on it yet. Missile defenses and like skin that can withstand, you know, radiological blasts and whatever. And I mean, anybody can. By the way, you can look at the plane and see that it doesn't have these exterior protrusions that we all know from the.
- [19:04]
Jeff Stein
So it was a public service, I think, I think reported these concerns of the Secret Service.
- [19:10]
Shane Harris
Right. So, you know, the reporters report what they report and they have, you know, FBI agents show up at their door with subpoenas demanding that they testify, identify their sources. And then the New York Times reveals that they understand that subpoenas for phone records have been delivered to one reporter's mom and the spouses of two other reporters. It's just insane.
- [19:29]
Michael Isikoff
Can I just say I totally share with you the outrageousness of this, but worth remembering. First, some context. This is not the first administration to subpoena the records of the phone records of reporters. It happened quite a bit under the Obama, Eric Holder, Justice Department. I remember James Risen had his credit card records, his phone records, all AP replaced by the government. And I'm not sure that the prevailing court rulings are going to protect the journalists here.
- [20:06]
Shane Harris
I think you're right.
- [20:07]
Michael Isikoff
I mean, if this goes to the Supreme Court, you know, there's certainly appellate court rulings that would uphold what the Justice Department is doing here. The new wrinkle between the distinction between what Obama, Holder did and what is being done now under Todd Blanche and Trump is that they went to the reporters homes and they went there first
- [20:31]
Shane Harris
without trying to do other means to find out who the source was.
- [20:35]
Michael Isikoff
Yeah, they just went direct. But those are administrative rules regulations that were tossed out by Pam Bondi anyway as soon as they got there. It doesn't have the force of law. So this does strike me as, you know, potentially quite dangerous for all of us because if this gets litigated, we all in the press could lose.
- [20:58]
Jeff Stein
Very troubling. And I have another troubling issue to bring up. The changing counterterrorism strategy. We have to step away for just a moment.
- [21:08]
Michael Isikoff
Update. After we taped this podcast, the Justice Department told the federal judge that it would withdraw the subpoenas to the Times reporters, at least for now. The judge had strongly criticized the Justice Department for failing to use other methods to determine who leaked allegedly sensitive information about the security on the Qatari plane being used by the president before resorting to subpoenas for the journalists. Quote, subpoenas are not the first thing you do. They are the last thing you do. Said the judge. Now back to the pod.
- [21:43]
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- [23:12]
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- [24:15]
Jeff Stein
Okay, we're back. We have a new counterterrorism strategy issued by the administration which seems to focus on everything but Islamic terrorism and other threats. Now the focus is going to be on drug cartels and antifa. Let's talk about that, Shane.
- [24:39]
Shane Harris
Yeah, I mean, this is kind of a piece, isn't it, with the administration's policy of designating drug cartels as. As foreign terrorist organizations so that it can have in. In their view, some legal rationale for blowing up fishermen on boats because they think that they're carrying drugs, which in their viewer, Weapons of mass destruction or something.
- [24:59]
Michael Isikoff
Do we think they were fishermen, by the way?
- [25:01]
Shane Harris
I don't know. I mean, I'm being a little flip in some of those cases, I'm sure, Mike. I'm sure some of them were actual drug dealers, but. Yeah, thank you. But I mean, it's, but it's really. I mean, it's, you know, doesn't mean
- [25:15]
Michael Isikoff
they should have been executed.
- [25:17]
Shane Harris
That's exactly right. That's exactly right.
- [25:18]
Michael Isikoff
And I think it's not a capital offense.
- [25:20]
Shane Harris
Right. If there, if they're, if there actually were lawyers reviewing this administration, which I suspect they're not, they might point out
- [25:26]
Jeff Stein
there was a story that emerged yesterday that maybe the administration is using AI to go after these targets.
- [25:34]
Shane Harris
Kind of do. Targeting. Yeah, I mean, it's, it's the, the other thing that's, I mean, you know, kind of troubling in all of this is that, you know, it's, it's. It's one thing, if you want to start talking about, you know, violent radicals on the left is posing a security threat, okay, fine. But if. Then this counterterrorism strategy is to divert resources away from the actual known threats from religious fundamentalist groups and the people we've been fighting for a long time. That's obviously, I think, is pretty objectionable. You know, it's the whole, the antifa thing. I think when I hear this, I. What I'm hearing is a sort of blooming rationale now, which you see when the administration especially is talking about Cuba, which they were doing in the past week and, you know, throwing out the dreaded communism label and I mean, to hear Marco Rubio and some people talk about it, you would think that, like, the Weather Underground is back and, you know, and like. And the radical groups of the 60s have been, like, hiding away and like, living in Cuba and leaking with antifa. And I Mean, I don't mean, I mean, I mean to make some light of it obviously, but like it's really more of a rhetorical strategy, it seems to me, than it is an actual security policy. And it feels like it's all building towards us trying to like bump off the regime in Cuba or making a
- [26:49]
Jeff Stein
case against domestic opponents of.
- [26:52]
Shane Harris
Yes. Of the Trump administration, which there's been some examples already.
- [26:55]
Karen Greenberg
But there's kind of an interesting thing going on and I'm just curious in your take in this line of what's going on with ODNI overall, like what is actually happening? They're talking about moving NCTC to dhs, right. So that would be taking away a primary part of their counterterrorism mission. They're not pivoting to something else within odni. You know, they're talking about taking, reducing the function of Intelligence and Analysis Office at dhs. What's happening with what were our counterterrorism structures in it's. It seems to be that, that they are either pivoting towards domestic or just giving up. And it's happening structurally and there's no way to stop that or to think about it. And what's this, what's going on in terms of opposition to this?
- [27:41]
Shane Harris
I mean, a couple things there. I mean, I guess ODNI has, you know, it's what, 20 years old now. I mean you'll find Republicans and Democrats both that will say maybe it was a well meaning policy, but it's, it's not lived up to its potential what we intended for it or it's just
- [27:57]
Jeff Stein
grown way beyond, grown way too big.
- [27:59]
Shane Harris
And you know, I mean, which many pred.
- [28:01]
Karen Greenberg
Predicted, by the way. I just want to say many predicted.
- [28:03]
Shane Harris
You know what, nobody has really though answered, I mean, I think to anyone's satisfaction is, okay, let's say you dismantle this organization, this office, odni, what do you do then with all of its components? And you point out Karen, like, okay, so what do you do with nctc? You still need a clearinghouse, I think, for counterterrorism information. Some people will say, well, CIA Counterterrorism center handles that just fine on its own. And the Bureau has joint terrorism task forces and we kind of go back to what things looked like before we had an odni. Okay, well, maybe. But you know, what about the nic, the National Intelligence Council, which has actually been important in adjudicating differences of opinion and analysis from across the agencies. And you know, why do we need that? Well, we can remember the other Reason we started a DNI, which was the flawed analysis about Iraq in 2003 and WMD, and that you need a function to sort of sort all this stuff out and make sure the policymakers know who the dissenting is.
- [29:03]
Michael Isikoff
But the nick, the National Intelligence Council has been decimated. One of the. Yes, when Pulte went in, what he did do, he didn't fire as many people as was expected, but he did take out the senior national intelligence officers at the NIC for Russia, Ukraine, for China, for East Asia, for wmd. I mean, it basically hollowed out the nick.
- [29:28]
Jeff Stein
Same is going on over at the State Department, by the way, the little, great little intelligence shop that could inr intelligence and research State Department, which has often been pressing on threats to the United States and an analysis of ongoing conflicts that's been whittled down to virtually nothing.
- [29:49]
Shane Harris
Yeah. And I think, you know, if I had to, like, think of, like, you know, Karen, to your point, like, what's going on, like, what's the unifying theory in all of this is I think that you do have. Have lawmakers, mostly Republican probably, but not exclusively, who feel ODNI has gotten too big. It's bureaucratic, it's not what we designed it to do. Tom Cotton has been probably the most vocal voice on that front. And you're kind of. It's almost like it's opportunistic. Now you have this administration that's in charge, that doesn't really think deeply, I think about, like, the size of bureaucracy and whatever. It's just people who, like, want to go after and attack the police state. Right. Like, they want to get back at Trump's enemies and, like, root people out. And, I mean, you know, and I think that those two impulses have kind of married together. And if you remember, I mean, when Tulsi Gabbard was testifying and at her hearing, which did not go well, I mean, there were a lot of Republicans who were just really upset that she wouldn't say that Edward Snowden is a traitor. And it looks like she might not get through. The thing that Tom Cotton extracted from her to support her nomination was that she would go in and gut the place and she would cut staff. And to me, that was always the tell where you could see that Republicans, Americans were like, we don't think these are serious people, but we can get them to do what it is that we've wanted for a long time.
- [31:08]
Jeff Stein
Speaking of people who don't say things, Jay Clayton, the presumptive next Director of National Intelligence, would not say during his confirmation hearings that Joe Biden was elected president.
- [31:23]
Shane Harris
Correct.
- [31:23]
Jeff Stein
Just like the others, including the attorney general nominee, cannot not bring themselves to state the fact that Joe Biden was like. Now, this, admittedly, is a bit of a Democratic Party trap. You know, sure. To put them on the spot, get them to say something that they know will get them in trouble with the president. But still, if the head of national intelligence cannot be straightforward with, you know, the public and the Senate about who was elected legally, that's very troubling, because when crunch, the inference is that when Trump, when crunch comes and he's got to tell some facts to the president, some intelligence, hard facts to the President, he'll crumble.
- [32:13]
Shane Harris
Yeah.
- [32:14]
Jeff Stein
Is that fair?
- [32:15]
Shane Harris
I think that is exactly the concern. Right. And I thought that, you know, Clayton, I will say, like, went out of his way to say, to answer the question every way except the most straightforward way. Like, at one point he said, look, I'm not an election denier, but in context, it's about. It's almost like saying, I'm not a flat earther, but I will not say the earth is round and revolves around the sun, because that's a trap.
- [32:36]
Karen Greenberg
Good analogy.
- [32:37]
Michael Isikoff
Right.
- [32:37]
Shane Harris
It's sort of like, it's like, come on, man. It's just like we all see what's going on, and he was getting pissed off, too, and I get it, but I think that. That's right, Jeff. It's like, you know, you're asking for a job and they love to, everybody loves to stand up there at these hearings and say, like, you know, as it's written on the wall of the CIA, tell the truth, and the truth will set you free. Well, then tell the truth, damn it. If you can't tell it on television, how do we expect that you're going to be able to tell it to the President?
- [33:00]
Jeff Stein
And.
- [33:01]
Michael Isikoff
Okay, but let's remember the context here, because that testimony was the day before Trump's big nationwide TV address about how our election system can't be trusted because of, presumably, foreign meddling and, and, and many other reasons.
- [33:25]
Jeff Stein
But Clayton was a bit squishy on that.
- [33:28]
Michael Isikoff
Clayton. Yeah, we should talk about those. What was released as part of the White House rollout last week. But look, the broader danger here is that they're setting up to do something for the midterms, to interfere, meddle in some way, cast a cloud, anything from sending ICE agents to the polls to raising all sorts of questions that would undercut a electoral victory for the Democrats. If that's what happens in November. How seriously do you think we should be taking those concerns?
- [34:10]
Shane Harris
I think seriously, and I'm glad that you pointed out that it seems like the motivation here is to raise this public doubt, doubt and suspicion. Like if you tuned in to watch Donald Trump's speech, it was clear that he didn't even understand exactly what he was saying and he seemed kind of half hearted in it. And you like, you need like a codex to follow at home and whatever, but it's the broader import of it all. It's the broader, the way that it makes people think there is something funny going on here. There's something I can't trust. And that's always been the drumbeat with these kind of these election denial claims to make people think that even if the result comes out, when the result comes out, if it doesn't come the way that I want, it must be because of fraud. And that's really corrosive. I mean, you know, we, and we don't have to imagine what the potential results of that would be. We saw them on January 6, 2021. And I think that to me that's just that it all kind of goes back to that as being one of these worst case scenarios. And it feels like what Trump wants to do is undermine confidence in the election and the process. Process. The question I think I, I do gonna grapple with is, is why? Is it because he thinks that's going to help Republicans? I don't think he really gives a damn if Republicans win or lose, honestly. I mean, well, he doesn't, he doesn't
- [35:34]
Michael Isikoff
want to be investigated by the House again, doesn't want to be impeached again
- [35:40]
Shane Harris
and have to go through all that. He looks at, I think he looks at this and said the Republicans get wiped out in the midterms, that's their fault for not like going all in with me. And he said things to like this publicly, but yeah, he doesn't want to be investigated. But you know, one point, if they think that this is going to encourage Republican turnout, I guess I would point to like, well, you know, your claims about election denialism are arguably why there are two Democratic senators in Georgia right now. Because it suppressed Republican votes because they thought the election was rigged. But I think you raised the other like really troubling Specter, Mike, which is, does he decide that he wants to send ICE agents to the polls and try and somehow federalize the election? And there I can see like some motive that he's driving about of like, I want to seize control of these things. I want to be in control. And there has been this kind of contingent in the election denial land who have drafted this executive order, which I think it's been made public that essentially says if, you know, if there's some national emergency that threatens the elect integrity of the election system, which Trump might see as, you know, China interfering broadly, then he can somehow nationalize the election under the Federal Emergencies act or the National Emergencies act, which, I mean, I'm not a lawyer. I've talked to a lot of lawyers. Just. That's. That's nuts. You can't do that. Who would stop him?
- [37:01]
Michael Isikoff
Right. Has that been signed? Has that executive.
- [37:03]
Shane Harris
No, he hasn't signed it. No. And I was wondering if he. It's been. There's been drafts floating around. I wondered if he might announce. Announced last week when he was doing the primetime address, whether he was signing it. That's kind of the thing floating in the background. It would immediately be challenged in court because the Constitution gives the authority to the states to administer elections. But, you know, I think we have to sort of, you know, with, like, with the address, it's like you almost have to put aside the fact that the documents that he released do not actually say what he said. That's not the point. Right. The point is to sow doubt out. It's to create a false pretense, potentially, for trying to seize the election. And, you know, the details are just details from his point of view. They don't really amount to much. It's the overall thrust that I think.
- [37:48]
Michael Isikoff
What did you make of the docs that were released? What left out to you?
- [37:52]
Shane Harris
I mean, I thought a lot of them just kind of underscored how much Russia has interfered in our elections in
- [37:57]
Michael Isikoff
the past decade, which went unmentioned in Trump's speech, by the way. He said not a word about that.
- [38:03]
Shane Harris
How about that? No.
- [38:05]
Michael Isikoff
Right.
- [38:05]
Shane Harris
No, look, I mean, I do think that they also showed a pretty persistent effort by China to influence politics and public opinion in the United States. Are we surprised by that, though? I mean, this isn't like China wasn't manipulating voting machines, and even Trump didn't say that.
- [38:22]
Jeff Stein
Right. And the voting machines are not connected to the Internet.
- [38:25]
Shane Harris
Right.
- [38:26]
Jeff Stein
That needs to be said again and again. But swinging back to Jay Clayton again, yet Jay Clayton was pretty squishy on whether he would follow Tulsi Gabbard steps to get involved in ballot seizures and counting. That was very disturbing to me.
- [38:47]
Karen Greenberg
Yeah.
- [38:47]
Shane Harris
And he didn't. I mean, you know, he couldn't just come out and say I think elections in the United States are, you know, safe and secure. Because you said, Mike, I mean, you know, he. Although he swore he had no input on the president's speech the next night, I'm pretty sure he could imagine that he wasn't going to come out and say, congratulations, America, your voting system is secure. Yeah, I think it's troubling. I mean, you know, they. Senators have pointed out that Tulsi Gabbard was president for an FBI raid in Fulton County. Why was an intelligence official showing up for a law enforcement action that itself was conducted under highly dubious circumstances? You know, it.
- [39:23]
Karen Greenberg
It.
- [39:24]
Shane Harris
It's another instance of, you know, looking at Clayton and being like, what do you really believe? What would you really do? I mean, he wants to present himself as someone of great integrity who speaks truth to power. I don't know many people in this administration who really do that. And so, you know, I.
- [39:43]
Michael Isikoff
Do you know of anybody.
- [39:44]
Shane Harris
I'm trying to think. I'm racking my brain here. It's. It's not part of the job description.
- [39:51]
Jeff Stein
Lastly, it's not really in our intelligence lane, but the big bombshell that broke yesterday with this deal with Saudi Arabia to provide them the means to develop their own nuclear power, obvious fears that they would follow a path toward developing a nuclear weapon. Then suddenly, Trump throws another stone in the water today, saying, well, they've got to recognize Israel first.
- [40:21]
Michael Isikoff
After the deal was already signed.
- [40:23]
Shane Harris
Yeah, it was signed yesterday. There was apparently a. Chris, the Energy
- [40:29]
Michael Isikoff
secretary signs it with the Saudis. And then the next day, Trump says, oh, by the way, there's this other condition.
- [40:35]
Commercial Narrator
Interesting.
- [40:36]
Michael Isikoff
That wasn't in there.
- [40:37]
Shane Harris
It's perfect. Trump, though, right? I mean, it's just. It's like, you know, you do this deal and you say, oh, one more thing. It's like the Colombo clause or something. And it's like, I think I saw a quote going around from the Saudis saying, well, it's already been signed. I think, though, it is subject to congressional approval. Right. In a certain time window. I don't know what to make of what Trump's precisely doing there, other than he always does this. Right. He always tries to throw in the contract modification. I think that he, I suspect, would very much like to see Saudi Arabia join the Abraham Accords, because he points to that as his one notable foreign policy success of the first term. Right. And I'm sure he still thinks he's going to win a Nobel Prize. But, you know, if you really wanted this to be part of the deal, you should have done that when the terms were being negotiated. I think the Saudis are probably, you know, I would just, I don't know for a fact, but I can't imagine that they're that surprised that he tried to pull a fast one on them like this.
- [41:40]
Michael Isikoff
Well, I got one more item I just want to throw out there to wrap this up. James Woolsey, the former director of the CIA passed away this week. And you know, of course many of us knew him in his post CIA days as a big neocon supporter of the Iraq war and other sort of neocon type activities. But I was struck just in reading the obituaries that about his difficulties in even getting an appointment with the president who appointed him, Bill Clinton. And he joked about that to some extent, but he couldn't even get in the room. That's how far out of the loop he was. And that's kind of a curiosity. It's interesting. It most likely says a lot about, you know, the dynamic he had with, with Bill Clinton. But it occurred to me that there was a, A, A, a byproduct of that that was, that played out in the following years, which is he was succeeded by George 10 Senate, who was very intent on being in the loop with the White House. And that kind of became his hallmark. That continued into the Bush, the George W. Bush administration. And when you look back at the fiasco of Iraq war intelligence, I think you can see the sort of afterglow of that, that of that phenomenon where Woolsey couldn't get in, was out of the loop. Tenant wanted to be in the loop and wanted to stay in the loop. In order to stay in the loop, he had to tell the Bush White House the what they wanted to hear.
- [43:36]
Shane Harris
And he did so interesting.
- [43:38]
Jeff Stein
Exhibit A on a malleable CIA on the, on the downside of a malleable CIA director.
- [43:46]
Michael Isikoff
Right.
- [43:46]
Jeff Stein
Or, or now National Intelligence Director. On that happy note, we have to bring this to an end. Shane, thanks for taking the time from your very busy reporting schedule and demands to spend this time with us on the Spy Talk podcast.
- [44:05]
Shane Harris
My pleasure. Thanks everybody.
- [44:06]
Karen Greenberg
And thanks for the reporting.
- [44:09]
Shane Harris
Absolutely.
- [44:10]
Karen Greenberg
Really appreciate it.
- [44:11]
Jeff Stein
Good point. 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 operations. Just Google Spy Talk and you'll quickly find 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.
- [44:52]
Michael Isikoff
I'm Michael Zigoff.
- [44:53]
Karen Greenberg
I'm Karen Greenberg.
- [44:55]
Jeff Stein
Thanks for listening.
- [44:57]
Commercial Narrator
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