Harry Litman [00:00:07] Welcome to Talking Feds, a roundtable that brings together prominent former federal officials and special guests for a dynamic discussion of the most important political and legal topics of the day. I'm Harry Litman. We know that our adversaries view periods of presidential transitions as times of potential instability and vulnerability for the United States. This year, that's particularly true. President Trump only this week, and only 75%, acknowledged the reality of his loss, but the Biden team is already getting a late start and coming in to take control of a government that Trump continues to insist should be his to run for four more years, and many of his 70 million or so followers may agree. Moreover, Trump's post-election purging of critical military and homeland security officials, and their replacement with inexperienced political partisans leave the country short-staffed in these 10 weeks. And who knows what other worrisome moves Trump may be undertaking as part of his bitter end. Pardons anyone?
All of which makes the current juncture in national security particularly critical. We got a first glimpse of a Biden approach in his introduction of his national security team with the announcement, a slight dig at the president that, "America is Back." But how will the incoming administration attempt to repair the damage, at home and abroad, that the last four years have inflicted? All of this means it's more than high-time for a return trip to the booth in the back of the Double Agent Bar and Grill, to eavesdrop on the candid discussion of some of the most knowledgeable and experienced national security experts in the country. And they are:
Josh Campbell. Josh is a CNN correspondent covering national security and law enforcement. He's also an adjunct senior fellow with the Center for a New American Security, and the author of the book "Crossfire Hurricane: Inside Donald Trump's War on Justice and the FBI." He previously served for over a decade as an FBI special agent, conducting national security investigations both domestically and overseas, and was appointed Special Assistant to the FBI Director. Josh, thanks so much for being with us today.
Josh Campbell [00:02:43] Likewise, Harry. Great to be back with you.
Harry Litman [00:02:45] Kate Brannen. Kate is the Editorial Director of Just Security, an NYU Law based forum on Law, Rights and Security. Kate's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Foreign Policy, The Guardian, Slate and The Daily Beast, among many others. She previously was a senior reporter covering the Pentagon for foreign policy. Kate, thanks very much for returning to Talking Feds.
Kate Brannen [00:03:08] Thank you for having me.
Harry Litman [00:03:10] Sam Vinograd, CNN's national security analyst, the senior adviser at the Biden Institute, and former Senior Advisor to the National Security Adviser under President Obama. Sam is also the author of CNN's Presidential Weekly Briefing, a fellow of the University of Chicago Institute of Politics, and a regular figure on Talking Feds. Sam, very good to see you.
Sam Vinograd [00:03:34] Great to see you, Harry.
Harry Litman [00:03:35] And finally, Frank Figliuzzi. Known to everyone who watches MSNBC or listens to this podcast, Frank is a frequent national security contributor to NBC and MSNBC, and he's the former FBI Assistant Director for Counterintelligence. Frank's the author of "The FBI Way: Inside the Bureau's Code of Excellence," set to be published in January 2021, and sure to be a definitive account and a must read about the bureau in the 21st century. Frank, as always, thanks so much for coming.
Frank Figliuzzi [00:04:14] Hi Harry, we got a lot to talk about. I can tell you what's on my mind is, for once there's some good things to talk about. I think so many times Harry, we're all talking negative, but we've got much of the national security team named by Biden. I'm wondering what everybody thinks about the selections at each of the agencies, and what the selections mean for our national security?
Sam Vinograd [00:04:36] Well, you know, I know a lot of these nominees, and I can tell you that they're top notch from a professional perspective. When you look at Jake Sullivan, who will be our national security adviser, Avril Haines, nominated for DNI, Ambassador Linda Thomas Greenfield, nominated for US UN, and Alejandro Mayorcas nominated for DHS, and I do think we will get a CIA Director nominee in the coming days as well as SECDEF. All these nominees have one thing in common: they're experts. They're experts, they're apolitical, they have decades of experience, and they they know the president elect very well. Particularly for the national security adviser, I think that will come in quite handy, Jake Sullivan and the president elect have worked together for a long time.
And, you know, two other quick points to remember about all these individuals: they have very well-known reputations overseas, which is going to come in handy as they seek to repair a lot of the professional relationships from, with our intelligence partners, with other foreign ministers, with their allies. They also have really strong relationships with Congress, and when I look back at the history of the national security apparatus under President Trump, they destroyed the relationship with the legislative branch. Particularly the State Department, Mike Pompeo refused to show up for hearings, refused to get documents, so all these individuals are well known on Capitol Hill. Those that need to be confirmed, I think they will be confirmed, and I think it's a priority for them to get that system back together of legislative oversight and executive branch briefing the Hill, and that sort of thing. So I feel pretty good about all this.
Josh Campbell [00:06:12] I think one other additional aspect here is when you look at the people that will now be surrounding the incoming president, there is a stark contrast when you look at who President Trump decided to surround himself with, and the first thing that really strikes me, in addition to the expertize that Sam mentioned, is none of these people are firebrands. They don't have that reputation, there have been stories that have been told throughout the past administrations, throughout the Obama administration, where sometimes people would engage in heated conversations in order to forcefully move the ball forward on the policy realm issues that are important to them, but these aren't the type of firebrands, when you think about Pompeo and and others that President Trump has surrounded himself with. So that will be interesting to watch. You know, the old adage, personnel is policy, with President Biden seemingly trying to have a team that is similar to him not only in expertize, but also in demeanor.
That will be interesting to watch, and then secondly, I think it's also worth noting just how incredibly diverse, this is the initial set of appointees that we now have nominees at this point. But just looking at the diversity, I mean, look at the the next potential UN ambassador, obviously an African-American female, someone who - her own story, talking about being at LSU, Louisiana State University, a college when she was young that did not want her there. A college that was court ordered, there was a mandate that it had to take people of color, and so that started her story. You look at the nominee to lead the Department of Homeland Security, this will be, should he be confirmed, the first immigrant to lead the DHS, which I think is not only important from a diversity standpoint, but also the symbolism of kind of how that agency has been accused of straying from its mission, especially as it pertains to immigrants. I think that will be of importance. So you just look at that slate of candidates, I think it's something that's quite different than what we've seen over the last four years.
Kate Brannen [00:08:03] Frank, I was going to say too, Sam talked about rebuilding relationships with the Hill and overseas partners, but also there's an enormous amount of just internal rebuilding that has to be done. Morale is terrible at a lot of different agencies, at the State Department obviously, I know at CIA and other intel agencies people have sort of been waiting with one foot out the door to see who's going to come in. You don't have a CIA director yet, but I know with Avril Haines, it's like a huge boost to the intelligence community that there's going to be a professional, there's going to be someone who's apolitical. And I think that the selection alone will do a lot for morale, but then once these people actually come in and start their jobs too, and just start to rebuild relationships with the White House, but also within the departments themselves, and I was thinking today, I was reading a Politico story about Tom Donilon, who I know is Sam's old boss, possibly leading the CIA, and it said sort of one of the knocks against him was that he was a demanding boss who made you work hard. And I thought, well, that's like, that shows you...
Sam Vinograd [00:09:02] I'm not sure why that's a bad thing.
Kate Brannen [00:09:05] Exactly, it's not really a bad thing, and it just shows you the caliber of people we're talking about versus the unvetted folks that Trump would bring in, that the media would then vet, and like true skeletons would come out of their closets that made them highly unqualified to do their jobs. And as we look at who he's putting in place at the Pentagon now, are completely inexperienced for the jobs they're being asked to do. So, I mean, the caliber of professional expertize is just it's just really striking.
Frank Figliuzzi [00:09:33] Yeah, those themes of experience, maturity and as Josh said diversity, looking like the nation they're securing, looking like the world we're helping to secure, they jumped out at me. I'm focused on CIA, and Sam mentioned CIA, and I'm also concerned about FBI because there's been so much thrown about that maybe Trump in his final weeks will bounce Chris Wray. So, Sam, at CIA, you think Jeanne is headed out? Is that what you're thinking?
Sam Vinograd [00:10:03] I think the president-elect Biden will likely nominate a new CIA director, yes. I don't think that that's anything about Director Haspel specifically, I think that the president elect will likely want to have his own nominee in there. There are two leading contenders whose names have been bouncing around the media who I know well, Tom Donilon and Michael Morell. Both of them bring different skill sets to bear and would be excellent. But I do, I do think that Director Haspel likely won't continue her tenure into the Biden administration. FBI director Wray I can't, I can't speak to. And now of course, we don't know who Trump is going to fire next, in the next 50 or whatever days, so I don't know if Director Haspel will make it, nor whether Chris Wray will until January 20th at noon.
Frank Figliuzzi [00:10:45] We both came from the bureau Josh, what are you thinking about the bureau, and Wray, and what should happen there?
Josh Campbell [00:10:50] Yeah, just as Sam mentioned, I mean, everyone's kind of on firing watch right now, waiting to see who comes next and in talking to people inside the FBI, one thing that was interesting, this is about a week ago. This was in the wake of the president getting rid of the secretary of defense, and I was asking people inside the bureau, well, what do you thinking, are you worried? At that point, one person said something that was very interesting, and that is that they are expecting or anticipating anything because the president is obviously very unpredictable when it comes to certain - well, when it comes to a lot of things, but the one barometer for the FBI was what happens to the CIA director, and that is, if the president - President Trump, fires Haspel, then as someone described to me, then we start to worry because the rationale for removing Gina Haspel, presumably from all of our reporting, has been the president is unhappy that these intelligence chiefs are not doing his political bidding, to rid out the so-called deep state. And basically, Haspel and Wray would be in the same bucket of wanting to get rid of them. Now, to be sure, to fire someone this late in the game would be an act of spite, essentially, right?
You're on your way out the door, and what's fascinating, comparing the CIA director to the FBI director, you look throughout history, most presidents have wanted to bring in their own CIA director. There have been exceptions obviously, with George Tenet and the like, but, and even John Brennan, who recently wrote in his new book that he had proposed during his time, and that the White House, maybe a seven year term for CIA director to try to extend that and possibly move them beyond administrations. That was shot down immediately, and one of the rationales that I guess came from people both in Congress and at the White House was unlike an FBI director, the CIA director is also involved in covert action, and that's an important part that has to resemble the president's own policies, and so you want someone that will do your own bidding.
The FBI director is different, because obviously I mean, as you know, Frank, as well, being the FBI, you don't wake up every day wondering, 'OK, who is the president today and how is that going to impact my work?' It just simply doesn't work that way. But, long story short is that people inside the FBI are worried at this point, not because they think that the FBI director has done anything wrong, but just, now the president basically has two arrows left in his quiver, and that is to fire people, and to pardon people. Those are basically his major centers of power right now. We know the pardons are probably coming, I'm sure we're gonna talk about that, but being able to fire people, the president who had a TV show that was based around firing people may be one less dramatic act to try to clear the decks.
Frank Figliuzzi [00:13:19] Yeah, I'm a staunch advocate, no surprise, of maintaining the 10 year term for FBI director. We've had enough damage and perception of partisanship among the public, largely driven by Trump. And so we don't we don't need this anymore. It erodes the mission of the bureau, and I would be an advocate even to send that message even stronger, if perhaps Trump fires Wray, I would like to see Biden say, 'you know what, I believe so much in this 10 year term, I'm bringing Wray back to finish his term.' Kate, one of the things I have not given a lot of thought to is the issue of whether or not a CIA director should be cabinet or sub-cabinet, and it seems to me when you have a DNI who allegedly oversees the intelligence community, that that's your cabinet level person. What are your - have you given thought to this whole issue of who's cabinet and who's not?
Kate Brannen [00:14:07] I haven't thought about that. I think so much of it does boil down to personalities, although some of that is dependent on the president himself. But just looking at Trump, it doesn't really matter if you're cabinet or not cabinet, or if you're - if you look at Pompeo, who has been such a bull within the Trump cabinet, it didn't matter if he was CIA director, secretary of state, he was sort of the loudest guy in Trump's ear, and it didn't matter the position he held. And I think that that probably translates to different administrations, Sam might know better than me, but if a president connects better with his defense secretary than, y'know, whoever the CIA director than that person is more influential, so I feel like influence does really come down to relationships at the end of the day.
Sam Vinograd [00:14:48] I would say I think it's just very different functionality. So, I certainly understand and we all know well, why the DNI was created, why the CIA in many ways reports up through the DNI in a lot of ways. But having been in the situation room with both the director of National Intelligence and the CIA director, they do perform different functions around the table. I think keeping the CIA directors at a cabinet level makes sense, keeping the CIA directors a member of the NSC, versus just packaging that all up with the DNI, still makes a lot of sense, Frank. And y'know, we again, we're waiting to see who's named as CIA director, if it is Michael Morell or Tom Donilon. They understand that, Tom Donilon has a very close relationship with the president elect, but Tom Donilon used to run those NSC meetings, so he knows what you go to the DNI for and where the CIA director comes in.
It is interesting, but the president elect has already said that the position of U.N. ambassador would become a cabinet level position again, and I was thrilled to hear that because under President Trump, and with I think Mike Pompeo's urging, that position was relegated to reporting to the secretary of state. So the UN ambassador did not get a seat at the table, our current U.N. ambassador, Kelly Kraft, has no diplomatic experience that I can think of. And what President-elect Biden has done is name a woman with 30, I think 35 years, 34 years in the Foreign Service, deep experience with refugees, migration, African affairs, but he's nominated Ambassador Thomas Greenfield for this role, and has said that it will become a cabinet position again, so I think that we'll see the cabinet kind of return to what it's supposed to be, which is full of experts representing all the instruments of American power.
Frank Figliuzzi [00:16:28] So I would just throw this in: we still haven't heard, with regard to the attorney general position, and I I want to just point that out because I view the attorney general role as part of the national security team, in that they so often have to weigh in. Not only do they oversee the FBI, that's part of the intelligence, but also they just show frequently on the legality of actions and techniques that it's a critical role as well. Let me ask you this, have you ever given thought - maybe there's a degree of hubris in doing this, but - let's say you're now, your picked for one of these agencies or cabinet positions. This is no easy task, people are breathing a sigh of relief. Yes, Biden's in, yes he's got an experienced team. But my god, the work they have cut out for them at these agencies, even just undoing what's been done. So, go through and pick an agency, go through what it would be like to head DHS or, or even CIA, what you start doing, what's your goal? What's your objective?
Sam Vinograd [00:17:22] Well, I can take the NSC, and others can chime in on others, but let's also remember that the transition process under President Trump to the president-elect is certainly not doing the incoming administration any favors. I am not entirely confident that the outgoing administration is going to give Biden's team the best quality material and information that's possible. And that hasn't happened before. So, you know, we have this issue of whether President Trump's transcripts on the codeword server are going to be given to Biden and this and that. So, there's that handicap, and so to a certain degree, the incoming administration could be hamstrung by an inadequate transition, which means when they come into power, they're going to have to be putting the jigsaw puzzle together, and trying to figure out everything that happened before they came in, and that's what we try to avoid during the transition process. Internally, the national security team is going to have to reestablish a national security process.
So, again, you have experts running these departments and agencies, but getting the NSC running again, having substantive meetings with principals and with deputies, getting the PDB back up and running, which I have no doubt they can do. But I mean, it's these things I just took for granted in government that they're going to have to reestablish operationally. One of the biggest hurdles is going to be recruitment and retention within the federal government. How many quality people were pushed out or left? My dear friend Cathy Russell, Ambassador Cathy Russell is going to be - head of the office that hires everybody. Just getting the right people back into the government is going to be a big focus for the White House. And then finally, I think for the NSC, reestablishing credible policymaking is likely going to be a key priority. And you do that by having informed substantive analysis, ready for the national security advisor and the president, but also just spending a lot of time with international counterparts saying, what we said, that America's back. Here we are, you know us, you know how we operate. Let's get back to work. So I think that external engagement piece is going to be key at the NSC.
Josh Campbell [00:19:20] I can take the Justice Department. I think that there is so much to be done there, on so many different levels, and just to to name a few, I mean, to start out, you've had under President Trump, a Justice Department that has been so close to the president in a way that the norms and traditions dictate that it should not be. I mean, if you think about what the Justice Department is and its component entities, federal law enforcement, these are agencies that have the ability to deny someone their liberty, to arrest people, for putting handcuffs on people, right? Denying them their liberty is such an incredible power, and so the theme, at least throughout most of the modern existence of the Justice Department and its component agencies, has been to ensure that you are apolitical, that you are not seen as in the club of a particular White House. And yet what we've seen with the president, time and time again, President Trump, is to try to constantly blur or even bulldoze that line of demarcation there to separate the political entity, the White House, from these institutions of justice. And so that will take repair, and I think President elect Biden has already signaled that in a sense, saying that one question came up about, well, what about these investigations in the Trump world that may come up during your administration?
And he said, I'm not going to be making those decisions, the Justice Department's going to be making those decisions. And so that in and of itself shouldn't be a novel idea, but for folks looking for independence, that's a breath of fresh air. But then also very quickly, I mean, think about two important constituencies for the Justice Department. First, the American public writ large, people have to have confidence in these institutions. The president has been engaged in an all out campaign of assault, trying to diminish the integrity of these organizations, calling them crooks, the deep state, basically questioning in the minds of American citizens whether the FBI and other agencies are actually fair in what they do, and so that will take repairing. But then also, and maybe this isn't thought about as a top priority, but I think it's an important one. There's a constituency out there in law enforcement across the United States who obviously look to the Department of Justice. Sometimes there's, it's not all Kumbaya. There's some rocky relationship sometimes between local and federal law enforcement, but in the main, you think about the attorney general as the nation's top cop, who is trying to at least set the table for other agencies about what the Department of Justice might fund, programs, obviously trying to get law enforcement through this turmoil that we've seen in 2020, all these questionable incidents of excessive use of force.
And so how will the Justice Department treat those issues with improving policing and reform in America, which is all obviously tied together because the ultimate goal is to ensure public confidence. Bottom line, a lot of work there to be done. This isn't a partisan statement to say this, but I don't recall in any administration, at least in my lifetime, following politics and following government that we've ever sat in the aftermath of a presidency and talked so much about how we're going to rebuild these institutions that maybe we've taken for granted, and to try to get them through a very partisan period of turmoil, that is just unprecedented.
Kate Brannen [00:22:20] Frank, I ask, since you asked the question, I jotted down my thoughts about the Pentagon, and then I realized, like, my list could just go on and on about sort of the steps that could be taken there. I think first, like figuring out where the bodies are buried, what happened, whether it's weapons contracts that might not be above board, or whatever might have gone on within the department that hasn't been reported on, sort of figuring out what - especially in these final days, which when he's appointed these sort of political apparatchiks to take over the Pentagon, like what have they been up to? But clearly, reaffirming a commitment to NATO is huge. Trump has all but left NATO, but that's sort of at the top of the list. Reestablishing civil military relations and civil control of the military, sort of putting professionals in the policy positions. I think as much as Trump sort of talks about, 'they're my generals,' he completely dismisses the advice of the Joint Chiefs, the president reestablishing that relationship.
Trump in these final days has changed troop levels in Iraq and Somalia and Afghanistan, but he hasn't talked at all about what the mission is, so I think reestablishing what these missions are overseas for our troops and then deciding troop levels based on that, I think sending a really strong message that white supremacy won't be tolerated within the military. I think that's been allowed to be stoked and tolerated on some level, and getting a grip on where that problem is at. And then another one, reaffirming an acceptance and welcoming of the LGBTQ community is huge, and that's probably true across agencies. And then also a really simple one, but I think really powerful symbolically is if a troop is killed overseas, making that trip to Dover Air Force Base, which Trump hasn't done in over a year or more. There's so much to be done, and yet there are so many - Trump doesn't even perform the basics of government, and so there are so many like, very easy things you can do, I think.
Frank Figliuzzi [00:24:09] Yeah, there is so much hard work ahead for this agency and community leaders. I really think DHS, in partnership with whoever the attorney general is, is going to really have to tackle extremism and domestic terrorism because that is not going away. If we have a president that launches a media platform, 70 million people voted for him, he immediately declares he's a candidate again, we've got QAnon and Proud Boys and Boogaloo and all of them and violent militias, that won't go away. And I think it's time to tackle this topic of domestic terrorism, what it means, whether there are gaps in the law that need to be addressed. And then y'know, Kate mentioned finding where the bodies were buried. How about where they're not buried? How about the bodies that Trump has put throughout these agencies, and those who signed off on things like separating infants from their mothers at the border? Where are all of these people in the fabric of these agencies, weeding them out, figuring out legally how you can do that, or not, asking for resignations of everyone, and then this issue of who Trump has just planted at NSA, or at DHS, and at the Pentagon, how do you go about doing that? And obviously, if there's a senior level person that serves at the pleasure of the president, fine. But what about below that? How do you, how do you get rid of those people?
Sam Vinograd [00:25:32] An interesting phenomenon here, and I will note, I think Congress has a decision to make after January 20th, which is how much time do they want to spend conducting oversight of what federal departments and agencies did these last four years? And I feel sick every time I hear about these children. We still can't find their parents, but just how much time does Congress want to spend, separate from any law enforcement issues from an oversight perspective, looking at what happened these last four years? But, Frank, you mention what's happening on the personnel front right now. We have two different phenomena at play right now. One, we have President Trump engaging in burrowing of political appointees, which is a term used when you kind of convert political appointees into career or civil servant slots. That happens in every administration, not at a huge degree, but it happens. I'm worried that President Trump is going to do that at a much higher level, which makes it harder to fire these people once President elect Biden comes into office.
But two, President Trump issued this executive order in October, that didn't make a whole lot of news because there so much else going on, in which he created a new class of federal employees, and they're called Schedule F, which could create a lot of problems for current career civil servants and the protections that they currently have if they're converted to this new class. And it could be a place where all of the, I don't even know the appropriate term, but all these political appointees under Trump are put into this new category of employment so that they get to stick around after Trump leaves. So, we're kind of in an unprecedented place on the personnel front, and then of course, we have him firing people from the Defense Policy Board, I mean, Madeleine Albright and Jane Harman, really? That's your hill to die on, you're going to fire them?
And having political acolytes running the transition process, so the personnel funny business at play right now could have lasting consequences. President-elect Biden could unwind this executive order on the schedule F category when he comes into office, but the burrowed employees, like the new general counsel of the NSA, Michael Ellis, who has a very controversial and concerning past - and by the way, not a heck of a lot of intelligence experience, but it will be much more difficult to remove him from his role because Trump converted him into a career slot.
Frank Figliuzzi [00:27:51] My God, it's yeah, it's a daunting situation. Josh may appreciate this, I can recall a director that I worked for when I was AD, when you couldn't really jettison someone from the bureau. You would, I can remember a director saying about someone in that position, 'put him somewhere he can't harm anything.' And so it was I thought, if we can't fire him, off he goes to some tiny field office somewhere, never to be heard from again.
Josh Campbell [00:28:21] It's an important point that you make, and this is what gives me a little bit of hope in this whole thing, and that is that you can shuffle people around, as long as they don't lose their same schedule or rate, in which case if you demote someone and they can say, 'well, you retaliated against me for political reasons,' but for example, with the general counsel for NSA, that was done even without the support of the director of the NSA. So, you know that this was, there were some possible shenanigans going on there. But I read there was one quote in The Washington Post where someone at NSA had actually said that, we'll find this person in nice office somewhere where he won't lose a cent in pay, but he won't be able to cause that same kind of damage. So we'll see, but what's fascinating is the fact that we're even having this conversation. And I think this gets to a larger part that President Trump and some of his allies have simply, the actions that they have taken has resulted in them no longer getting the benefit of the doubt with any action.
I mean, you look at some of the people that he sent NSA and over to the Pentagon, these are some of the same people that were involved in Devin Nunez's so-called midnight run, right, when he was hell-bent on trying to uncover the deep state in all of this. And they're just not honest brokers, in my mind, as a journalist who looks at this and says, well, is this person trustworthy? Can we trust them? Well, what do you do? You look at their pattern of activity, and at least that pattern would dictate that anything that takes place, we now have to scrutinize very heavily. And I would presume that not only the media, but also the incoming Biden administration will be doing just that.
Frank Figliuzzi [00:29:46] Hey, Kate, do you think there is any method to this madness of Trump planting people in these various positions or, what's going on? What's he got up his sleeve, anything?
Kate Brannen [00:29:55] I don't think there's a clear answer yet. There are lots of theories being floated, one is just venal vindictiveness on Trump's part. I think that probably played into Esper losing his job, he didn't back them up on protecting confederate-named bases, and so Trump didn't view him as loyal enough. Which we saw after the impeachment trial was over, trump cleaned house of the people he thought crossed him in that experience. But then it's also sort of whether it's Kash Patel, or Ezra Cohen-Watnick or Anthony Tarta, they're leaving government with a notch on their resume that's completely undeserved, that, I think, translates directly into private sector dollars. I was the undersecretary of defense for policy. I mean, that's something that you can cash in on, and when it comes to corruption and just pure greed, I think that that's often at play with these guys. But you also, like I mentioned, the troop numbers, there are these policy things happening. There was a report, I think, last week about the options on bombing Iran being considered. So I think people are still holding their breath to see if this is part of a policy, foreign policy push that's going to happen at the end that hands Biden a even worse hand. We're going to mess up things even further in Iran, or whether it's Iraq or Afghanistan, and you will have an even harder problem to solve. I think that's a running theory that that also, I think holds a lot of weight as well.
Frank Figliuzzi [00:31:16] I agree. I think it is all of the above. I think it's vindictiveness, he's firing people and then planting people who will perhaps facilitate real ugliness in the next couple of weeks. We've already heard Trump is asking people, 'hey, can I attack Iran?' We've heard now in the news, just in these last few hours that an Iranian nuclear scientist was assassinated, somebody green lighted that. Now, that's been happening for years, but...
Sam Vinograd [00:31:37] We don't know if that was the US, but looks like Israel.
Frank Figliuzzi [00:31:39] I'm not saying it was the US, but you know that even if it was, it was the Israelis, they likely ran it by somebody. But we'll see. And also, just getting rid of information, figuring out where the dirt is, all of these positions could be positioned to do that.
I know Harry likes to do Five Words or Less, where we're challenged to concisely respond in five words or less to a question. And the question Harry's given us is, who's next to get pardoned? I'll take the first crack at this with my five words: Assange, Snowden. God help us. I, that's, that's where I'm at. Those are the two people I do not want to see pardoned, and I will, my head will explode if that happens. But, what are your thoughts?
Josh Campbell [00:33:10] I think in four words, I'll answer that question with a question, and that is probably an easier way of handling it and that is: who won't he pardon? I think there's going to be a very long list on the way out the door, which will probably include his own name.
Frank Figliuzzi [00:33:23] He's going to try to do himself, I know he is. And that gets into the whole question of legal scholars far, far greater than my legal training who think he can't pardon himself, but they'll try, and maybe even ask Pence to do it for one or two days as president.
Sam Vinograd [00:33:39] I'll say: Trump friends and family list.
Frank Figliuzzi [00:33:45] Friends and family discount, there you go.
Kate Brannen [00:33:48] I'll say: Paul Manafort, cause why not?
Frank Figliuzzi [00:33:53] Yeah, he's done he's done his time, that's for sure.
Sam Vinograd [00:33:56] Oh, man, I can't believe we're even laughing about this stuff because it's just so terrible, but that's the point that we're at, right?
Josh Campbell [00:34:02] Well, this is the one area, too, that we - he's unpredictable, but I think we can say, probably with high confidence, that there will be a list. And how lengthy that is, we don't know. But we talk about this nonstop, I mean, both from a national security legal standpoint, and that is Trump world does have significant legal exposure, and if the president is smart in the sense that this whole campaign of manipulation, manipulating the public into believing the FBI, the Justice Department, Mueller, every three letter agency, basically anyone who doesn't agree with him is corrupt enough to get him, that narrative resonates with a large segment of his base, and now a pardon is a way to seek to capitalize off of trying to portray himself as a victim.
And so whereas most of us will probably look at that and say, well, that's a corrupt act to try to pardon yourself and to pardon other people based on their interactions and relationship with you, what he will say is, look, I've been the victim. These people have been out to get me, and so that's what makes this so frustrating. This isn't a Clinton pardoning Marc Rich at the end of his time in office, which was largely seen as corrupt. There was no way to explain that away. This is something President Trump is going to try to explain away, and sadly, I think that there's going be a large segment that buys it.
Kate Brannen [00:35:14] He's used it, I mean, to influence behavior. I mean, the promise of a pardon, I think, has shaped whether it's Paul Manafort, Michael Flynn. It's been dangled, he's enticed the behavior he's wanted out of them, which is essentially to keep quiet or not cooperate, and now they're getting rewarded.
Josh Campbell [00:35:30] Can I ask Frank a question? So, just because I know that you have the new book coming out on The FBI Way, I'm curious, you're in the shoes of an investigator who spent all this time putting together a case, working with prosecutors. You have someone convicted, you have someone at times pleading guilty, and then now with the wave of the hand, the president does something that he is allowed to do by law. But how does that square with the FBI way and how agents and analysts are taught to comport themselves and to see the law?
Frank Figliuzzi [00:35:58] Boy, I used to, I used to mentor agents and analysts and tell them, listen, don't get upset that your case was declined, or don't get upset because there's always a larger purpose, and maybe the White House has grabbed this great espionage case and is going to parlay it into a diplomatic deal. That's a good thing, don't get worried about it. But here we are talking about your investigative work, perhaps the lifetime case, just being vaporized, right? The blow to morale, as you know, is just horrible, but I also would encourage those personnel to package that case up and go approach a local D.A., or county or state prosecutor, and see if they can find a way to get that charged some other way. And, look, it's going to happen, and I think it will put in start contrast the fact that new leadership is coming in, and justice and normalcy can be restored.
Harry Litman [00:36:57] That's our episode for today. I hope you enjoyed being a fly on the wall in the back of the Double Agent Bar and Grill, listening to the most knowledgeable national security professionals compare notes on the very critical issues at this vital time for the country's security agencies. Thank you very much to Frank, Kate, Sam and Josh, and thank you very much, listeners, for tuning in to Talking Feds. If you like what you've heard, please tell a friend to subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, or wherever they get their podcasts, and please take a moment to rate and review this podcast. You can follow us on Twitter, @TalkingFedsPod , to find out about future episodes and other Feds-related content. You can check us out on the web, talkingfeds.com , where we have full episode transcripts.
And, you can look to see our latest offerings on Patreon, where we post discussions about special topics exclusively for supporters, such as the one we just posted on the six month anniversary of the unrest in Minneapolis with a civic leader of that town, Duchesne Drew, and with Andrew Weissman about his op-ed in The New York Times calling for an investigation and potentially prosecution of the president by the Biden administration, and also discussing the pardon of Michael Flynn. So there's really a wealth of great stuff there, you can go look at it to see what they are and then decide if you'd like to subscribe. Submit your questions to questions@talkingfeds.com , whether it's for Five Words or Fewer, or general questions about the inner workings of the legal system for our Sidebar segments. Thanks for tuning in, and don't worry: as long as you need answers, the Feds will keep talking.
Talking Feds is produced by Jennifer Bassett and Rebecca Lowe Patton. Our editor is Justin Wright. David Lieberman and Rosie Don Griffin are our contributing writers. Production assistance by Matt McArdle. Our consulting producer is Andrea Carla Michaels. Our gratitude, as always, to the amazing Philip Glass, who graciously lets us use his music. Talking Feds is a production of Dalito, LLC. I'm Harry Litman, see you next time.
