When he leaves office, can ex-President Trump be trusted with America's national security secrets?

[bucolic_frolic]

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/when-he-leaves-office-can-ex-president-trump-be-trusted-n1248994

When he leaves office, can ex-President Trump be trusted with America's national security secrets?

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"This is not something that one could have ever imagined with other presidents, but it's easy to imagine with this one," said Jack Goldsmith, who worked as a senior Justice Department official in the George W. Bush administration.

"He's shown as president that he doesn't take secret-keeping terribly seriously," Goldsmith said in an interview. "He has a known tendency to disrespect rules related to national security. And he has a known tendency to like to sell things that are valuable to him."

Goldsmith and other experts noted that Trump has a history of carelessly revealing classified information. He told the Russian foreign minister and ambassador in 2017 about extremely sensitive terrorism threat information the U.S. had received from an ally. Last year he tweeted what experts said was a secret satellite photo of an Iranian nuclear installation.

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More at the link.

[dhol82]

1. On the other hand, he could be a useful conduit for misinformation

[muriel_volestrangler]

35. An unwitting double agent?

He'd be good at the 'lack of wit' part, anyway.

[onecaliberal]

2. No. I'd bet money he's not trusted now.

[True Blue American]

5. The fact that so many

Are concerned over whether he gets briefings after he leaves show he is not trusted now.

[Brother Mythos]

8. Agreed!

The Loser can't be trusted now.

[TxVietVet]

3. trump has probably already committed treason.

For some reason, the intelligence agencies haven’t revealed that information yet because it may expose top secret collection systems.
If you carry a mobile phone, you can be exposing your location and private conversations even if the mobile phone is “off”.

[onecaliberal]

11. I'm sure he has.

[bucolic_frolic]

12. John Schindler

Last edited Fri Nov 27, 2020, 02:35 PM - Edit history (1)

the former NSA man, among other positions, mused many times on Twitter about this being similar to the Venona project, a post WWII Cold War operation that lasted into the 1980s. I'm guessing the financial roots are so deep and so systemic that they can't root it all out at once or the system would collapse. Besides it's good for employment and federal budgets in the business. They can't release the tax returns too fast either, same reasons?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venona_project

[NCDem47]

4. Change the locks and passwords and scramble the spies.

And keep an eye on that snake Jared.

[orwell]

6. NO...

...he has proven himself a traitor when it suits him.

This is the most dishonorable person who has ever held the office...and that's saying something.

[stopbush]

7. tRump is no doubt threatening to reveal top secret info

if he is prosecuted for any crimes, state or Fed. It’s a big, scary bargaining chip for him.

[treestar]

9. hopefully he does not understand most of it

[DFW]

10. I seriously doubt he was entrustred with the most sensitive stuff after the first three months

I think the non-politicallly appointed staff of both defense and intelligence realized that telling Trump anything was like telling Putin five minutes later.

[Aristus]

13. I don't think he could accurately memorize any real national security secrets.

I don't think he could accurately memorize a telephone number.

Anyway, national security secrets have a half-life. The longer he's out of office, the less relevant the security secrets he had access to while he was in office will become.

[empedocles]

14. .

[Leghorn21]

15. Hell to the NO

Not since May of ‘17, at any rate

NOPE

[Grasswire2]

16. Jared's a risk, too.

Surely he has hoovered up as much secret info as he could. May have passed it on already. We know he uses platforms that disappear the message.

[Warpy]

17. Unlike former presidents, he will be useless as a diplomat

so there would be no reason to share secure information with him.

I think the risk is minimal. He doesn't understand it, he garbles it, and he confabulates to cover up all the stuff he doesn't understand.

He'll still try to sell the word salad as the bills fall due and he can't pay them.

[DetlefK]

18. Simply do the usual background-check for a top-secret security clearance on Trump:

https://news.clearancejobs.com/2020/09/17/what-does-it-take-to-get-a-top-secret-security-clearance/

What are the criteria for obtaining a security clearance?

The adjudicative criteria used to issue any security clearance are:

(1) Guideline A: Allegiance to the United States

(2) Guideline B: Foreign Influence

(3) Guideline C: Foreign Preference

(4) Guideline D: Sexual Behavior

(5) Guideline E: Personal Conduct

(6) Guideline F: Financial Considerations

(7) Guideline G: Alcohol Consumption

(8) Guideline H: Drug Involvement

(9) Guideline I: Psychological Conditions

(10) Guideline J: Criminal Conduct

(11) Guideline K: Handling Protected Information

(12) Guideline L: Outside Activities

(13) Guideline M: Use of Information Technology Systems

He surely wouldn't have problems passing all 13 tests, would he?

[bucolic_frolic]

19. Civic Duty award to you

That trumps Trump!

[PSPS]

26. Unfortunately, none of this applies to a president.

All presidents automatically have the highest security clearance without having to go through any vetting. It is assumed that, after having won election to the position of president, they already have the imprimatur of the country for ... well, everything. The question is whether or not that extends beyond their term. Do Carter, Obama and Bush retain their security clearance?

[Martin Eden]

20. Does Trump know any national security secrets?

He's notorious for never bothering to read his daily intel briefs.

As explained in the video linked below, the means & methods of intel gathering (of which Trump is likely ignorant) are far more sensitive:

&feature=youtu.be

[bucolic_frolic]

24. Thanks for the post, Beau is always on top of his game

He mentions UK and Israel as having great intelligence. True. Intelligence gave Britain the edge in WWII. Nazi intelligence was inferior, prone to rigid no-worries thinking, and didn't seem to question information that was planted upon them again and again.

A wonderful book about the role of British Intelligence in WWII is J.C. Masterman's "The Double Cross System in the War of 1939 to 1945". Not one German agent, it is said, operated successfully inside Britain during the war. All such entities were converted or subsumed as double agents.

The spy operations of the World Wars are coming to public knowledge. There is a book "Churchill's Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare", as well as a couple others whose names escape me, one about the role of pigeons in WWII spy operations.

Pigeon book: "Operation Columbia"

Another WWII spy book: "Avenue of Spies"

Not the complete titles, but those are the first few title words.

[MineralMan]

21. Donald Trump's Usefulness to Our Adversaries Ends on January 20.

After that time, he will have no further classified information, nor any power in the US Government.

Our adversaries will have to deal with the Biden administration. Trump will no longer be useful to them.

[PSPS]

27. Have Carter, Obama and Bush lost their security clearance?

[MineralMan]

28. I have no idea. Do any of them have access to classified

materials at this time? If not, it doesn't matter.

[PSPS]

30. If they do, that's another fix that our horribly broken system needs.

[MineralMan]

32. I think former presidents have no access

to new classifed information. They have no need to know, which is a basic requirement. Trump will get no new briefings, and paid no attention to them as President.

[brooklynite]

22. He'd have to remember a secret to leak it...

Someone who ignores his intelligence briefings and doesn't read anything isn't going to have a lot to reveal.

[rustysgurl]

23. In this case it's a big fat NO

Locks need rekeying, passwords changed -- basically the entire intelligence community needs to reset to cover for what this indiscreet asshole is likely to spill.

[Ms. Toad]

25. Of course not.

But the time for worry about that was before the national security threat was elected.

At this point we just have to treat anything he had access to as compromised, and act accordingly.

[meadowlander]

29. This is why it's so important to prosecute him.

Is it a "custom" or a law that ex-Presidents still get the PDB? Because if it's a custom, Donnie has shown us what we can do with those.

[Hekate]

31. Not even a little bit, and I hope his PDBs are even more heavily redacted that they already were

In addition, nothing should ever go to him once he leaves office. He’ll just share it around and gossip about it.

[Buns_of_Fire]

33. "My Dear President Putin;

"Here is that 'special' box of chocolates I said I'd send you during our last conversation.

"Be careful when biting into the SPECIAL cherry cordials. Sometimes, they have 'pits' in them, and I don't want you to crack a tooth, HA HA *winkie* *winkie*.

"Your Best Friend Forever, Donwuld"

Normally, in response to the original question, I'd say "no" -- but I think that particular horse left the barn a long time ago.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

34. $400 million debt.

He'll trade secrets for money.