When our own politicians cannot be trusted with intel being leaked to the press, or enemy states…
One of the narratives to come out of the latest Iran conflict – and there have been many – is that the administration has acted without looping in Congress appropriately. The initial complaint was that Trump was going into war with Congressional approval, except that one fell apart when he did not actually engage in war efforts.
Now the latest is the attempt to spin that the administration is building up a false narrative that our embassies were threatened.
<Thread>
President Trump's claim of bomb threats to embassies is falling apart.
1. No threat to an embassy in intelligence briefings to Congress
2. Two senior administration officials appear to be admitting to WaPo that Trump's claim is falsehttps://t.co/HIAtktpZWt
— Ryan Goodman (@rgoodlaw) January 11, 2020
"President Trump said today that an Iranian general killed by a US drone strike was planning attacks on four US embassies, a claim made to justify the decision but one at odds with intelligence assessments from senior officials in Trump’s administration."https://t.co/dfX4krg5af
— Rachel Maddow MSNBC (@maddow) January 11, 2020
Fascinating dimension of the Trump era: all news orgs now hitting live with Trumps claim about four embassies and considering it as claim to be litigated even while simultaneously everyone universally understands he made this up on the spur of the moment.
— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) January 10, 2020
These are the people who for a week have displayed the tendency to believe the words of a terrorist-backing enemy state over our own government, so none of this is too surprising.
Recommended
Rep. Mo Brooks has been able to lend some perspective on the matter, and his impressions are both interesting and revealing. Brooks was in those intel briefings, and he noted a lack of willingness by the intelligence representatives to be completely forthcoming.
USA kills Sulaimani. Kudos! After 40 years, about time USA fights back against Iran terrorists.
In classified briefing, it appeared defense & intelligence reps held back info out of concern too many Congressmen can't be trusted to keep classified info from USA enemies.
Sad!
— Mo Brooks (@RepMoBrooks) January 9, 2020
Following this message, The Daily Wire reached out to brooks for more clarity, and he was quite forthcoming about the hesitancy of the officials.
They had reservations about sharing that classified information with Congress in that kind of setting — which in turn leads to the inference that they had a reasonable amount of distrust as to whether shared classified information would in turn be shared by members of Congress with the news media or our enemies.
Hardly shocking after the display we have witnessed. Look at how many mourned the death of a terrorist, General Soleimani. We saw American politicians racing to reach out to the pro-Iranian lobbying group National Iranian American Council, working with them to be critical of the administration the day after Iran targeted US sites with missile launches. And we are still in the cycle of those blaming Trump for Iran shooting down a passenger jet airliner.
It seems more than a little judicious to suspect that some classified information on a hot global event could be leaked to the press, or worse. If it is the case it seems very sad, and dangerous, that our members of Congress cannot be trusted to keep silent on classified details regarding sensitive military information.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member