Former CIA counterterrorism official and current counterterrorism analyst Phil Mudd tried to attack President Donald Trump late last week but ended up lending credence to deep state conspiracy theories by suggesting that America’s intelligence community is plotting to “win” against the president.
Appearing on CNN’s “The Situation Room” with host Wolf Blitzer, Mudd pushed back on Trump after he released the House Intelligence Committee’s memo and tweeted his criticism of the FBI’s leadership while showing support for “rank and file” agents on Friday.
“The president is talking about basically corruption at the FBI today, but we oppose the leadership,” Mudd said. “The workforce is going to look at this and say, this is an attack on our ability to conduct an investigation with integrity. There are hundreds of agents and analysts working on this investigation. It’s not just Christopher Wray, the FBI director.”
Mudd’s comments were most likely in reference to this tweet from Trump:
“So, the FBI people — I’m going to tell you are ticked, and they’re going to be saying, I guarantee it, you think you could push us off this because you can try to intimidate the director, you’d better think again, Mr. President,” Mudd continued. “You’ve been around for 13 months; we’ve been around since 1908. I know how this game is going to be played, and we’re going to win.”
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Mudd’s remarks drew instant reaction across social media: