The comments prompted immediate criticism from all corners of the intelligence and political words due to the fact, according to myriad government officials, that the officials leading the briefings would have never revealed any personal opinions or policy recommendations and because Trump was speaking at all about the contents of the top secret sessions. Trump did not get into specifics about what he learned in the briefings, one August 17 and the second September 2. “It’s concerning that Donald Trump was potentially sharing information that he learned in his briefing”, Mook said on ” Good Morning America”.
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Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has already had one since becoming the Democratic presidential nominee, and Republican nominee Donald Trump has had two.
Michael Morrell, a former Bush administration acting Central Intelligence Agency director who now supports Clinton, called Trump’s remarks “highly inappropriate” and said he “crossed a long standing red line respected by both parties”. “In nearly every instance, I could tell – I’m pretty good with the body language – they were not happy”. “I know I have been in a couple of these intelligence briefings that have been in stark contrast to the policy decisions we are seeing coming out of this White House. They would back off and say ‘those are policy decisions the administration is making'”.
The interruptions were enough to prompt the New Jersey governor, who also attended the briefing as a Trump adviser, to touch Flynn’s arm in an effort to calm the general down, one source said.
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence refused to comment. And the first time a presidential candidate has ever politicized a national intelligence briefing.
Asked if Trump’s comments could hurt morale within the intelligence community, Hayden noted that Trump recently declared that he doesn’t trust intelligence “from the people that have been doing it from our country”. “I mean, I’m looking at the generals”. “Donald Trump simply didn’t come prepared and he’s not going to be prepared to serve as president and that was abundantly clear”.
“What I did learn is that our leadership, Barack Obama, did not follow what our experts, and our – truly, when they call it intelligence, it’s there for a reason – what our experts said to do”.
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Leighton added, “It could be potentially disruptive to the services”.
