EXCLUSIVE: Senate Republicans are demanding that the Office of the Director of National Intelligence provide information on the status of security clearances for the 51 former officials who signed a letter claiming the Hunter Biden laptop was part of a Russian disinformation campaign ahead of the 2020 presidential election.
Just before the 2020 election, 51 former national security officials wrote a public letter claiming the Hunter Biden laptop had “all the classic hallmarks of a Russian intelligence operation.” It was signed by former President Obama CIA Director John Brennan, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and former CIA Director and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, among others.
Republicans are asking Haines to provide information on how many of the 51 signatories “maintained an active security clearance” at the time of the letter — between Oct. 1 and Oct. 31, 2020 — and how many currently have a clearance of security.
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The top Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Florida, along with Sens. James Risch, Tom Cotton, John Cornyn, Jerry Moran and James Lankford, wrote a letter Wednesday to the director of National Intelligence Avril Haines. , obtained by Fox News Digital, expressing concern about the letter and the potential “politicization of intelligence.”
Senator Marco Rubio, Republican of Florida and ranking member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, during a hearing in Washington, DC, US, Wednesday, March 8, 2023. Photographer: Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images (Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“We are deeply concerned that these former senior members of the US intelligence community misused their titles and connections to conduct a coordinated, partisan effort to protect President Biden during the 2020 election.” they wrote
“We now know that this letter was part of a deliberate effort to protect the Biden campaign in the final days of the election,” they continued, adding that the 51 former intelligence officials “highlighted their former titles and prior intelligence community experience to bolster them.” the credibility of the state and increase the effectiveness of this partisan political operation.”
Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark. (Getty Images) Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines (AP)
CIA ‘MIGHT HAVE ATTENDED SIGNATURE COLLECTION’ FOR HUNTER BIDEN LAPTOP DISCREDIT LETTER: HOUSE GOP REPORT
Meanwhile, Fox News Digital reported earlier this month that former CIA Deputy Director Michael Morell, who worked to write the letter and enlist the support of former intelligence officials, sent a draft of the statement to the CIA’s Prepublication Classification Review Board (PCRB) before doing so. it’s public
Morell also testified to congressional committees that it was the Biden campaign that orchestrated the letter to discredit stories about Hunter Biden’s laptop.
Hunter Biden, son of US President Joe Biden, arrives with his wife Melissa Cohen Biden before President Biden awarded the Presidential Medals of Freedom during a ceremony in the East Room of the White House in Washington, US on July 7, 2022. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)
Morell emailed the draft to the PCRB and wrote on October 19, 2020: “This is a quick job as it needs to be out as soon as possible.”
BIDEN CAMPAIGN ORCHESTRATED BLINKEN INTEL LETTER TO DISBRED HUNTER BIDEN’S LAPTOP STORY, EX-CIA OFFICIAL SAYS
Morell told the House Judiciary and Intelligence Committees that the PCRB “approved” the letter “as written” the same day.
Rubio and the senators are questioning Haines about whether ODNI or the CIA conducted a review of Morrell’s alleged “abuse of the CIA’s PCRB process,” and whether they investigated whether intelligence community employees at the October 2020 “participated or helped in the creation”. : of the letter.
“All of us in positions of public trust with access to classified information owe it to the American people not to abuse our positions for political purposes,” they wrote.
The CIA rejected the idea that politics play a role in the PCRB’s decisions.
“Political considerations play no role in the CIA’s Pre-Publication Review Board’s established process for determining whether information submitted by current and former officials contains classified information,” the CIA said in a statement to Fox News. Digital. “The PCRB is made up entirely of staff officers who conduct the reviews.”
Brooke Singman is a political reporter for Fox News Digital. You can reach her at Brooke.Singman@Fox.com or @BrookeSingman on Twitter.
