WASHINGTON (AP) — Donald Trump has long viewed the nation’s spy services with suspicion, accusing them of trying to undermine his first term and campaigns. Now that he’s returning to the White House, Trump’s promises to overhaul the U.S. intelligence agencies put him on a collision course with one of most secretive and powerful parts of government.
For the CIA and other intelligence agencies, the start of Trump’s second administration is a way to reset an often challenging relationship with a leader who has in the past dismissed them as the deepest of the deep state — Trump’s label for the thousands of career federal employees that carry out the work of government regardless of who is president.
For Trump, the return to power offers an opportunity to follow through on promises to clean house of officials that he believes have tried to challenge his leadership and criticize his actions.
The stakes of the relationship with the spy agencies couldn’t be higher and are almost certain to be reflected in Trump’s appointments to top positions.
Former and current intelligence officials also are watching for clues indicating whether Trump will use U.S. intelligence to inform foreign policy and national security decisions or whether he will realize the fears of critics, who worry he could spill classified secrets or seek to weaponize intelligence work against Americans.
“If he comes in committed to retribution and cleaning house, that’s going to impact the agency. We’re going to lose people, and there’s going to be this fear: ‘What will get me in trouble politically?’” said Douglas London, a 34-year CIA veteran who now writes about intelligence work and teaches at Georgetown University.
London said that in his experience, intelligence officials work hard to avoid any appearance of partisanship and put their constitutional oaths ahead of politics.
“There’s very little agency officials can do,” London added, “other than to show: ‘We’re here, we’re on your team, we’re here to support you.’”
Trump signaled his intentions the day after he won his second term.
“We will clean out all of the corrupt actors in our national security and intelligence apparatus, and there are plenty of them,” Trump said in a video released last week. “The departments and agencies that have been weaponized will be completely overhauled.”
In an effort to head off any difficulties with the president-elect, intelligence agencies are emphasizing their nonpartisan mission and their usefulness to any new president looking to understand a globe complicated by wars in Ukraine and the Middle East and the growing partnership between China, Russia, North Korea and Iran.
Intelligence officials won’t say if Trump has already received an intelligence briefing, but the Office of the Director of National Intelligence released a statement saying it is following a standard procedure for new presidents that dates to Dwight Eisenhower’s election.
“ODNI is acting consistent with the tradition, in place since 1952, of providing intelligence briefings to the president-elect,” the office wrote.
During his time in the White House or on the campaign trail, Trump has been anything but traditional, displaying an animosity toward the nation’s spy agencies unlike any seen since Richard Nixon, who believed the CIA and other agencies sought to undermine his presidency.
Trump often railed against the CIA and other spy agencies, accusing them of working to undermine his first administration and seeking to prevent him from retaking the White House. He also has blamed intelligence officials for questioning his relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Trump received fewer intelligence briefings as president than any other recent commander in chief. In 2021, President Joe Biden suggested that Trump should no longer receive the standard intelligence briefings given to former presidents, calling Trump “erratic.”
Trump also was accused of mishandling classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate — a case now stalled in the courts that prosecutors are seeking to wind down following the election.
Trump’s win gives him a mandate to carry out his vision for national security and intelligence, said Elbridge Colby, who served as a deputy assistant secretary of defense in the first Trump administration.
Colby said wars in the Middle East and Ukraine, along with China’s growing rivalry, show Trump doesn’t have time to be delicate with the nation’s national security and intelligence agencies, likening them to the Titanic heading toward an iceberg.
“If you turn the Titanic 90 degrees, people are going to fall out of their bunks, chandeliers and beautiful plates are going to get broken,” Colby said Sunday on Tucker Carlson’s internet show. “But that’s where we are. … President Trump ran against the system.”
Trump’s picks to helm the CIA and other spy agencies are likely to offer the first clues about his intentions.
Individuals mentioned as possible CIA directors include John Ratcliffe, Trump’s former director of national intelligence; Republican Rep. Mike Turner of Ohio, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee; and Kash Patel, a Trump aide who worked at the Defense Department and the National Security Council during Trump’s first term.
Patel has been upfront about his desire to use government to strike back at Trump’s critics and those who opposed his 2020 campaign.
“We will go out and find the conspirators not just in government but in the media” over the 2020 election, Patel said on Steve Bannon’s podcast last year. Trump and his allies have repeatedly claimed the that election was stolen, for which there is no evidence.
A spokesperson for Patel declined to comment. In a statement, a spokesperson for the Trump transition said the president-elect will reveal his administration appointments as they are decided but offered no timeframe for an announcement.
