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10 Sep, 4 tweets, 2 min read
NEW: Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle and intelligence experts are now concerned it may be too late to arm Americans with a clear and consistent assessment of the scale and nature of foreign election interference. politico.com/news/2020/09/1…
The topic of election security has become something of a taboo subject within the Trump admin. The NSC’s top legislative affairs official, Virginia Boney, was removed earlier this tear because she kept pressing the White House to prioritize election security efforts.
Efforts have followed to downplay Russia’s malign activities and play up the China/Iran threats. @MilesTaylorUSA recalls how the WH wanted to fire the former top DHS intel official, David Glawe, in Sept 2018, because Glawe agreed w/the IC's assessment about Russia's activities.
.@NeuSummits, who served as DHS' assistant secretary for threat prevention and security policy until earlier this year, said she is concerned about the effect the conflicting messages and allegations of intel politicization could have on DHS’ key election security partners.

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More from @NatashaBertrand

Natasha Bertrand Profile picture
29 Aug
CONFIRMED: ODNI told congressional officials that it will still provide written briefings on election security, but that they should not expect verbal in-person briefings on the topic, which give members an opportunity to ask questions & challenge briefers politico.com/news/2020/08/2…
MORE: ODNI decided to scale back the briefings because classified material from recent briefings leaked out. "We are concerned about unauthorized disclosures of sensitive information following recent briefings," per a statement provided first to @politico.
Sensitive information from written products can still be leaked, of course. But this new arrangement would prevent the kind of back and forth between members and national security officials that led to stories like this: politico.com/news/2020/07/3…
Read 6 tweets
Natasha Bertrand Profile picture
18 Aug
JUST OUT: Volume 5 of the Senate Intelligence Committee's Russia report, focused on counterintelligence threats and vulnerabilities. It's 966 pages long. intelligence.senate.gov/sites/default/…
Here's a summary of a document about that Michael Flynn sent to KT McFarland in January 2017 that "originated with a close associate of a Kremlin insider," per the committee, and that the WH counsel's office wanted to withhold, citing executive privilege. ImageImage
"As this experience illustrated, White House intervention significantly hampered and prolonged the Committee's investigative effort," report says. "Most importantly, some witnesses were directed by the White House not to tum over potentially privileged information..." Image
Read 19 tweets
Natasha Bertrand Profile picture
31 Jul
NEWS: Pelosi admonished top counterintel official Evanina during private briefing this a.m., accusing him of withholding info about Russia. Evanina ultimately acknowledged that Russia is trying to boost Trump’s reelection; Dems want him to say it publicly. politico.com/news/2020/07/3…
Asked for comment, an ODNI official said that "Unlike some, we don’t comment on the content of classified briefings," but said Evanina was “quite clear that the intel community will continue to update the American public ... on threats to the election and steps for mitigation.”
During the private briefing Evanina said he expected Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe to reveal more about the Russians' activity during the Worldwide Threats hearing, but whether that hearing will even happen is still in doubt. politico.com/news/2020/07/3…
Read 4 tweets
Natasha Bertrand Profile picture
21 Apr
Just out: The 4th installment of Senate Intel's Russia report, examining the IC's January 2017 assessment of Russian interference and Putin's motives.
"The Committee found no reason to dispute the Intelligence Community’s conclusions," Sen. Burr said. intelligence.senate.gov/sites/default/…
Here's what Senate Intel was told about the FBI's decision to include Steele's reporting in Annex A of the highly classified version of the intel community assessment:
The entire report is highly, highly redacted. Including this section on "Putin's role":
Read 4 tweets
Natasha Bertrand Profile picture
19 Mar
New: The US was completely unprepared for a slowly creeping pandemic—let alone a biological attack that would overwhelm it all at once. “When one thinks about what a bioterror attack would look like—it is crystal clear we're not even close to being ready." politico.com/news/2020/03/1…
Covid-19 was not manufactured. But the scale of the outbreak is the closest thing the U.S. has seen to how a bioweapon can shut down a society and severely strain resources, several sources said, & biodefense experts are watching its spread closely. 1/
“We haven’t seen anything that appears to be this pathogenic and transmissible since maybe 1918 or 1957,” said a US gov official. And the response so far to Covid “shows we don’t have the systems in place to rapidly diagnose cases, or to scale up a mass response very quickly.” 2/
Read 5 tweets
Natasha Bertrand Profile picture
12 Mar
NEW: Our deep dive into how the national security machine is staring down coronavirus, with new details about the intel community's role—it's extensive—and how NSC is managing the crisis without a global health security directorate, eliminated by Bolton: politico.com/news/2020/03/1…
CIA and ODNI have been providing daily coronavirus updates and briefings to the Senate and House Intel Committees, and are coordinating with NSC, focused primarily on whether other countries are truthfully reporting the number of coronavirus cases to the WHO.
The IC’s role is arguably more urgent now--with the epicenters of coronavirus in high-priority counterintelligence targets like China and Iran--than it was during the Ebola outbreak, where countries were generally transparent and welcoming of foreign help.
Read 5 tweets

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