Some CIA Personnel Colluded with Democrats, Part 2

The House Judiciary Committee, its Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, and the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence released a joint interim staff report titled, “The Intelligence Community 51: How CIA Contractors Colluded with The Biden Campaign to Mislead American Voters.”

We provided Part 1 of the text of the report yesterday, and conclude the report today.

In the final weeks before the 2020 presidential election, 51 former intelligence officials coordinated with the Biden campaign to discredit serious allegations about Biden family influence peddling.1 In issuing a public statement using their official titles, these former intelligence officials sought to cast an explosive New York Post story and Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop as “Russian disinformation.”2 President Biden even cited to the statement in a televised debate with President Trump shortly before the election to accuse President Trump of leveling false accusations. 3 As a result, the explosive allegations about Biden family misconduct were buried and millions of Americans cast their votes for president without a full set of facts. The 51 former intelligence officials’ Hunter Biden statement was a blatant political operation from the start. It originated with a call from top Biden campaign official—and now Secretary of State—Antony Blinken to former Deputy Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director Michael Morell. The Committees’ investigation revealed that without this outreach from Blinken, Morell would not have written the statement.4 Indeed, Morell told the Committees that the Blinken phone call “triggered” his intent to write the statement.5 The statement’s drafters were open about the goal of the project: “[W]e think Trump will attack Biden on the issue at this week’s debate”6 and “we want to give the [Vice President] a talking point to use in response.”7 The details as revealed by the Committees to date are concerning enough, but as the Committees have continued to investigate the origins of the Hunter Biden statement, new information has come to light. Through newly obtained internal CIA emails and testimonial evidence, the Committees have uncovered more information on the extent to which the intelligence community was involved in the statement. Specifically, the evidence shows:

High ranking CIA officials, up to and including then-CIA Director Gina Haspel, were made aware of the Hunter Biden statement prior to its approval and publication.8 Because several former senior intelligence officials signed the statement, the PCRB sent the draft statement to the CIA’s then-Chief Operating Officer (COO) Andrew Makridis, who said he subsequently informed then-Director Haspel or thenDeputy Director Vaughn Frederick Bishop that the statement would be published soon.9 Senior CIA leadership had an opportunity at that time to slow down the CIA’s process for reviewing publication submissions and ensure that such an extraordinary statement was properly vetted.10

Some of the statement’s signatories, including Michael Morell, were on active contract with the CIA at the time of the Hunter Biden statement’s publication. 11 Throughout the course of the Committees’ investigation, the signatories claimed to not have had access to any classified information when asserting that the allegations surrounding Hunter Biden’s laptop had “all the hallmarks” of Russian disinformation.12 However, at the time of the statement’s publication, at least two signatories—Morell and former CIA Inspector General David Buckley—were on the CIA’s payroll as contractors. Due to purported operational concerns, the CIA declined to declassify the entire universe of signatories who were on active contract. In addition, some signatories to the Hunter Biden statement also had special “Green Card” access to the CIA at the time of the statement’s publication, allowing them to gain entry to secure CIA facilities.

After publication of the Hunter Biden statement, CIA employees internally expressed concern about the statement’s politicized content, acknowledging it was not “helpful to the Agency in the long run.”13 At least one employee found it “[i]nteresting to see what was submitted and approved” when discussing media talking points that the statement’s co-author, former Senior Intelligence Service Officer Marc Polymeropoulos, submitted related to the statement.14 When discussing Polymeropoulos’s talking points, another CIA official stated, “It appears [Polymeropoulos] is actively involved in a pro-Biden campaign and may be disclosing classified information in his efforts.”15 The CIA’s internal review board, known as the Prepublication Classification Review Board (PCRB), determined that Polymeropoulos’s talking points contained classified information that had to be removed prior to publication.16

The new information included in this report, based on new testimony and declassified documents, shows the potential dangers of a politicized intelligence community. In the waning days before the 2020 presidential election, 51 intelligence community officials rushed to draft and release a statement using their official titles, presumably to convey access to specialized information unavailable to other Americans. The statement was conceived following a conversation with a senior Biden campaign official and designed explicitly to provide talking points to the Biden campaign to discredit politically damaging allegations. Some of the signatories of the statement were on the CIA payroll at the time as contractors and others had special access to CIA facilities. Even Michael Morell—before the Committees learned of his contract with the CIA—acknowledged, “It’s inappropriate for a currently serving staff officer or contractor to be involved in the political process.”

The infamous Hunter Biden statement had all the hallmarks of an intelligence community influence operation. But rather than carrying it out against our adversaries on foreign soil, this operation was directed at the American people and our democratic processes. It is impossible to know for certain how events would have played out differently if these 51 intelligence community officials never sought to influence the 2020 election. All the Committees may do now is present the facts as known to inform legislative reforms to protect our democratic ideals and prevent future abuse of the intelligence community for partisan political benefit.

Quick Analysis

Ukraine’s Frozen Conflict

As we approach winter in the northern hemisphere, the war in Ukraine is beginning to resemble a “frozen conflict” from many perspectives. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky recently told the media he hopes the war will end faster once President-elect Trump takes over in January. Opinions in Moscow, however, differ from that of the Ukrainian leader. Russian President Vladimir Putin argues that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) needs to exclude Ukraine from joining in “exchange” for peace. If it does not, he says, then no end to the war is in sight. So far there is no Christmas solution. Several NATO countries, according to Vladimir Socor of the Jamestown Foundation, are tentatively considering “coalitions-of-the-willing” to provide security for Ukraine outside of the formal NATO framework. There is, however, no collective mechanism today under which such an arrangement is viable. According to the NATO Charter, while Ukraine is a NATO partner country, it may not join as a full member since it has not fulfilled the requirements for membership. That has not stopped NATO and allies from continuing “to provide Ukraine with unprecedented levels of support, helping to uphold its fundamental right to self-defence,” according to the organization. Socor says that keeping Ukraine out of NATO will not advance peace with Russia. Waiting for a peace settlement, he suggests, would only serve to encourage Moscow to continue the war indefinitely. Although the Biden Administration officially withdrew its support for Ukrainian membership in 2021, NATO maintains an “open door” policy toward membership-seeking countries. The current White House position led the way for European states to oppose Ukraine’s membership saying that a decision should be delayed until “conditions are met.” Biden pushed for changing “open door” to a “bridge” metaphor. It is not intended as an across-the-board NATO policy and has been implemented in the past on a case-by-case basis, says Socor. “The alliance’s open-door policy was not fully insulated from Russia’s non-statutory blocking power, and NATO-aspirant countries’ path toward membership was not always irreversible.” Russia has successfully blocked states like Georgia from joining, first in 2008 and again after the war in Ukraine began in 2014. Russia recognizes the value add of Ukraine to NATO is enormous and that Kyiv has a better case than some other nations. Putin’s invasion was, in part, intended to foreclose that option. By 2021, Moscow was pushing hard to maximize its war objectives, which included further annexations of Ukrainian territory. A main goal for Putin was, and is, to ensure there is no Ukraine left to join NATO. As President-elect Trump prepares to assume office in January, he is faced with the historical challenges presented by the war. Post-conflict security guarantees were the center of several proposals made during the 2023 military stalemate. The incoming Trump Administration has yet to outline how it intends to handle the Russia-Ukraine war. Analysts in Washington believe that the new Administration will expect its European allies to guarantee the majority of Ukraine’s security needs. As we approach 2025, several European nations have acknowledged that they do not view Ukraine as eligible for NATO membership as it would draw the organization into the middle of the conflict. Others want to wait until the war is over or pending a “peace” settlement before considering Ukrainian membership. Socor reports that some “influential voices” are suggesting that “Kyiv should join NATO after “freezing” the war along a stable armistice line, de facto accepting Ukraine’s partition, with NATO security guarantees applying de jure to the government-controlled territory only.” This would mean starting accession talks soon with the actual talks to commence only after a ceasefire is in place. Trump arrives in Washington at a time when Putin’s hybrid strategies of war in Ukraine have eviscerated commonly-held differences between war and peace. “Absent a political consensus in NATO over Ukrainian membership, certain European allies, including France’s President Emmanuel Macron, are holding informal consultations about post-conflict security guarantees to Kyiv by NATO members outside of NATO’s framework,” according to the Jamestown Foundation. The Biden Administration downplayed the discussions on possible forms of military assistance and defense industry cooperation by sending only an Assistant Secretary of State. For a European peace to hold the Trump Administration would need to formally extend the United States’ nuclear deterrence to Ukraine. Options under discussion in Europe include a “coalition of the resolute” to deploy forces to Ukraine as part of a possible armistice package, deterring further Russian attacks, says Secor. European officials are also debating, without any agreement, whether its military forces could perform non-combat logistical roles to free Ukrainian forces to fight. None of the possible courses of action has moved forward as all eyes are waiting on the incoming Trump Administration for clues about its intended level of support for a NATO framework and other non-NATO proposals. Daria Novak served in the U.S. State Dept.