Hunter Biden investigation: Brennan condemned ‘politicization’ of intel days before laptop letter
Jerry Dunleavy Gabe Kaminsky
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Just days before signing an October 2020 letter baselessly linking the Hunter Biden laptop to Russia, former Obama CIA Director John Brennan condemned the “politicization” of intelligence on the podcast of Mike Morell — the ex-CIA acting director who said now-Secretary of State Antony Blinken “triggered” him to craft it.
Brennan, a longtime foe of former President Donald Trump, appeared on Morell’s Intelligence Matters podcast a week before the New York Post published stories on President Joe Biden’s son’s shady business dealings in China and Ukraine. This was also less than two weeks before dozens of ex-intelligence officials, led by Morell and organized in part by longtime Brennan aide Nick Shapiro, signed a letter making evidence-free claims of Russian involvement in the Hunter Biden laptop saga.
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A review by the Washington Examiner found that at least 17 of the 51 laptop letter signers appeared on Morell’s podcast over the years, with six of them joining the podcast in 2020, including two in the days leading up to the letter. The podcast appearances highlight the close relationship between Morell, Brennan, and many of the laptop signatories and shed light on how the 51 former officials came to sign the letter just before the 2020 election.
Brennan joined the CBS News podcast on Oct. 7, where Morell began by noting that “you and I are friends” and called him “one of the most ethical people I know.” Brennan was on the show to promote his book, Undaunted, which was highly critical of Trump. Morell told everyone to read it.
The ex-Obama CIA director was particularly upset on the show because then-Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe had declassified Russia investigation documents days prior, including handwritten notes from Brennan showing he briefed President Barack Obama in the summer of 2016 on an unverified Russian intelligence report claiming that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton planned on tying then-candidate Trump to Russia’s hack of the Democratic National Committee to distract from her use of a private email server.
“I think it was an outrageous, appalling, and blatant act of politicization,” Brennan said, arguing that Ratcliffe and former DNI Richard Grenell “have abused their authority in the position of the director of national intelligence in order to promote the very personal and partisan and craven objectives of Donald Trump.”
Morell claimed that “thanks to the rhetoric and to the actions of President Trump and those who enable him is that a significant percentage of Americans now see the intelligence community, to include the CIA, as the deep state. And that’s not going to just go away with an election of a President Biden. … So how would you advise the leadership of the IC going forward?”
Brennan replied by saying that Trump is “dismissive of intelligence and denigrates” the intelligence community and said, “It is incumbent on the future leaders of the intelligence community to speak out.” If Joe Biden won, there would be “much greater respect” for the intelligence community, Brennan said, calling it “so, so unfortunate that the intelligence work is now the subject of great partisan sniping on the Hill.”
The October 2020 laptop letter contributed to the baseless narrative that the Hunter Biden laptop stories were nothing but a product of Russian disinformation — a narrative happily seized upon by Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign and spread by some of the laptop letter signers.
David Priess, a former CIA officer and daily intelligence briefer, had joined Morell on the show days before Brennan on Sept. 30.
Priess warned about potential intelligence briefings to Joe Biden being “politicized” in the lead-up to the 2020 election. The former CIA briefer also lamented that Trump was “publicly chastising his own intelligence agencies or publicly undermining conclusions that they have reached.” Priess said he was “very worried” about a Trump reelection, claiming that the U.S. intelligence community was “under threat because of this very different presidency.”
On the other hand, Priess assessed that “most of the signs are positive that Joe Biden understands the role of intelligence in a democratic society.”
Morell told House investigators that prior to his Oct. 17 phone call with Blinken, he had no intention to write the Oct. 19 Hunter Biden laptop letter, and testified “yes” and “absolutely” when asked if the call with Blinken, who was then a top advisor for Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign, was what “triggered that intent in you.” Morell said it was his “guess” that Blinken called him to talk about the Hunter Biden laptop because the future secretary of state wanted it “out” in public that “the Russians were somehow involved” in the saga.
Republicans in Congress said Morell received a call from then-Biden campaign chairman Steve Ricchetti after the Oct. 22 presidential debate to thank him for “putting the statement out.”
The phone call to Morell had come from Jeremy Bash, another Hunter Biden laptop letter signer, who then got Ricchetti on the line. Bash, a former chief of staff at the CIA and Pentagon, was picked by Joe Biden to be part of the President’s Intelligence Advisory Board last year. He appeared on Morell’s show in November 2021.
John McLaughlin, a former acting CIA director under President George W. Bush, appeared on Morell’s podcast in April 2020, contending that “I don’t want to get overly political” before criticizing the Trump administration’s foreign policy. McLaughlin also appeared on the podcast in May 2018 and April 2022.
Glenn Gerstell, a former general counsel of the National Security Agency, appeared with Morell in December 2020, calling “disinformation” a “national security threat” and said foreign and domestic disinformation “both are dangerous.” In reference to Trump, Gerstell said, “When the president himself is one of the sources of disinformation, that has a great effect.” He also contended that Joe Biden would have to work to “restore the confidence of the American public in the intelligence community.”
Gerstell also appeared on the podcast in April 2019 and January 2023.
Former senior CIA operations officer Marc Polymeropoulos said in late 2020 that he and Morell helped put the letter together, and he appeared on the podcast in December 2020.
Morell told Polymeropoulos in an October 2019 podcast appearance that “people need to know that you and I are friends and our families are friends.” Morell asked Polymeropoulos if he had seen evidence of the “narrative” that the CIA “wants to influence politics here” in the United States.
Polymeropoulos called the idea an “utterly absurd accusation” and said that the “narrative is deeply insulting.”
Morell had previously hosted Intelligence Matters in collaboration with the Cipher Brief. He interviewed three laptop signatories during the podcast’s run there, including former CIA Director Leon Panetta and former National Counterterrorism Center Director Nicholas Rasmussen in September 2017 and CIA veteran John Sipher in January 2018. Morell had Panetta on the CBS News version of the podcast again in November 2021.
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Among other laptop signers, CIA Director Mike Hayden appeared on the first episode of Morell’s CBS News podcast in May 2018, former DNI James Clapper in June 2018, former Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence Mike Vickers in November 2018, August 2019, and March 2022, and former CIA analyst Nada Bakos and former CIA technical operations officer Jonna Hiestand Mendez in June 2019,
Former CIA officer Kristin Wood appeared on the show in September 2019 and March 2023, former acting National Counterterrorism Center Director Russ Travers in April 2021, and former CIA Analysis Director Winston Wiley in August 2021.