Former Director of National Intelligence <a href="http://John Ratcliffe dailywire.com https://www.dailywire.com › topic › john-ratcliffe" target="_blank" rel="noopener">John Ratcliffe</a> said Sunday that the Biden administration has given <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/iran" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Iran</a>, which reportedly greenlit Saturday’s Hamas invasion of Israel, far more than $6 billion worth of favors for the terrorist regime.
Ratcliffe, who served as national intelligence director under the Trump administration, appeared on Fox News on Sunday as experts and official claims appeared to tie Iran to the Hamas invasion, which led to the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust. Tehran helped Hamas plan the invasion and gave final approval on the Monday before the attack was launched, according to <a href="https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/iran-israel-hamas-strike-planning-bbe07b25" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Wall Street Journal</a>.
President Joe Biden came under fire over the weekend for a controversial hostage deal that saw the United States providing Iran access to $6 billion and five prisoners in exchange for five American hostages held by Iran.
“Look, it’s not even just this $6 billion, which clearly is going to further enrich Iran,” Ratcliffe said. “It’s closer to $60 billion. If you look at what the Biden administration has done to help this Islamic terrorist regime in Iran by [stopping enforcement of] sanctions, by lifting restrictions, by allowing Iranian oil to increase by 650% over the last year from 400,000 barrels of oil a day to 3 million barrels of oil a day – all of this has strengthened” the Iranian regime.
Ratcliffe said that the “real problem” in the Biden administration’s foreign policy in the Middle East is the “daylight” now perceived between the U.S. and Israel.
“The relationship has changed in the last two years,” Ratcliffe said of the U.S. and Israel. “The Biden administration wouldn’t even meet with the Israeli prime minister, but at the same time they were courting, at times begging, this Iranian regime to do everything from restarting nuclear talks to engaging in these kinds of, ultimately, ransom payments.&#8221;
“Ultimately, everyone sees that in the Middle East, and that is really what is playing out here before us right now,” the former head of national intelligence said.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
Former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe details how Biden strengthened the Iranian regime: 
&quot;It&#39;s not even just this $6 billion which clearly is going to further enrich Iran, it&#39;s closer to $60 billion.&quot; <a href="https://t.co/yr0qYXyVCS">pic.twitter.com/yr0qYXyVCS</a>
&mdash; Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) <a href="https://twitter.com/CitizenFreePres/status/1711043732282200209?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 8, 2023</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
The Biden administration has attempted to cool U.S.-Iran relations since Biden took office. One of the president&#8217;s chief Middle East goals has been resurrecting the Iran nuclear deal, originally negotiated under for President Barack Obama and heavily criticized by Republicans and Israel as providing insufficient oversight.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said over the weekend that the Biden administrations hostage swap with Iran and the $6 billion account Iran was given access to do not play a part in the Hamas investigation. He said that the money is only available for humanitarian purposes and that, in response to counters that money is fungible, Iran has always devoted resources to terrorism.
“Iran has always used and focused its funds on supporting terrorism, on supporting groups like Hamas. And it’s done that when there’s been sanctions, it’s done that when there haven’t been sanctions, and it’s always prioritized that,” Blinken said.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
&quot;What do you say about the argument that money is fungible — so Iran may have known this money is coming and used other funds to help fund this attack?&quot;
Secretary of State Antony Blinken: &quot;Iran has unfortunately always used and focused its funds on supporting terrorism&quot; <a href="https://t.co/t8kyDqOHk9">pic.twitter.com/t8kyDqOHk9</a>
&mdash; RNC Research (@RNCResearch) <a href="https://twitter.com/RNCResearch/status/1711026361932911037?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 8, 2023</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

John Ratcliffe

Trump Intelligence Chief Says Biden Has Given Iran ‘Closer To $60 Billion’ In Favors

Iran

Israel

Joe Biden

Former Director of National Intelligence <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/john-ratcliffe">John Ratcliffe</a> said there should be &#8220;more transparency&#8221; following a congressional hearing on unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP), popularly known as <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/ufo">UFOs</a>.
The Biden administration &#8220;made the decision to really not reveal much and now you end up with House Republicans having to have these public hearings,&#8221; Ratcliffe said during an interview with Fox host Maria Bartiromo on &#8220;Sunday Morning Futures.&#8221;
&#8220;I believe there should be more transparency on this issue, but not full transparency,&#8221; Ratcliffe added. &#8220;The primary role of the federal government is to provide for the common defense and you know we don&#8217;t share all of the national security information with the American people, but the government should have done a better job.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
Former Director of National Intelligence, <a href="https://twitter.com/JohnRatcliffe?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@JohnRatcliffe</a> was asked about David Grusch’s claims. He doesn’t deny them.
 “I’ve gone to the edge of talking about information that’s classified. I can’t go over that line. I just think they (Gov)could have put more information out…” <a href="https://t.co/o8J3ZBKR8h">pic.twitter.com/o8J3ZBKR8h</a>
&mdash; UAP News (@HighPeaks77) <a href="https://twitter.com/HighPeaks77/status/1685669297308282881?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 30, 2023</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
A House Oversight subcommittee <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/the-ufo-hearing-is-over-whats-next">held a UAP hearing</a> on Wednesday with testimony from David Grusch, a former U.S. military and intelligence official who has gone public with whistleblower <a href="https://thedebrief.org/intelligence-officials-say-u-s-has-retrieved-non-human-craft/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">allegations</a> about <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/whistleblower-testifies-he-knows-exact-locations-of-ufos">crafts of non-human origin</a> being retrieved and kept from <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/congress" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Congress</a>, and two Navy veterans who have come forward with claims about mysterious flying objects that appear to defy the laws of physics and could threaten national security.
<a class="c-link c-link--focus-visible" href="https://onelink.to/dwapp" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-stringify-link="https://onelink.to/dwapp" data-sk="tooltip_parent" aria-describedby="sk-tooltip-10964">CLICK HERE TO GET THE DAILY WIRE APP</a>
The Department of Defense released a statement <a href="https://twitter.com/GadiNBC/status/1684294693428027395">insisting</a> that its All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), which has been tasked with investigating UFOs, &#8220;has not discovered any verifiable information to substantiate claims that any programs regarding the possession or reverse-engineering of extraterrestrial materials have existed in the past or exist currently.&#8221; In addition, AARO Director Sean Kirkpatrick said the hearing was <a href="https://apnews.com/article/congress-ufos-uaps-pentagon-aliens-631ad4d174ee9559580935ec11afcf3f">&#8220;insulting&#8221;</a> to members of his team.
Ratcliffe, a former U.S. congressman who served as the final <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/director-of-national-intelligence">director of national intelligence</a> during the Trump administration, has <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/former-national-intelligence-director-john-ratcliffe-sounds-alarm-over-new-ufo-report">spoken out periodically</a> about UAP since leaving government.
In March 2021, Ratcliffe said <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/former-intelligence-chief-quite-a-few-more-ufos-detected-than-public-knows">&#8220;multiple sensors&#8221;</a> were picking up on mysterious flying objects with strange properties. He also claimed there were &#8220;a lot more sightings than have been made public.&#8221; Since that time, the federal government has stepped up efforts to investigate UAP sightings and <a href="https://defensescoop.com/2023/04/19/pentagons-uap-office-now-investigating-more-than-650-cases/">release some information</a> about hundreds of encounters, but Ratcliffe contended that the effort has been poorly managed by the Biden administration.
&#8220;Had the government managed this a little bit better, it wouldn&#8217;t be as controversial,&#8221; Ratcliffe said on Sunday.
&#8220;There&#8217;s a lot of things that are unexplained,&#8221; Ratcliffe said. “I’ve gone to the edge of talking about information that’s classified. I can’t go over that line. This current administration would love nothing more than for me to trip over a classified-information line. I just think we could have put more information out to talk about all of that.&#8221;

Ratcliffe Faults Biden Administration For Lack Of UFO Transparency

Former Trump Spy Chief Wants 'More Transparency' After UFO Hearing

Air &amp; Space

Director of National Intelligence

Politics

Whistleblowers

Leaked details about <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/donald-trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a>&#8216;s indictment are grounds for criminal charges, a top official from the former president&#8217;s administration said on Sunday.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ratcliffe-shoots-down-claim-that-three-chinese-balloons-crossed-over-u-s-under-trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">John Ratcliffe</a>, a former U.S. congressman and federal prosecutor who served as Trump&#8217;s final director of national intelligence, reacted to reports that Trump faces around 30 counts related to business fraud as part of the investigation led by Manhattan District Attorney <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/alvin-bragg" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Alvin Bragg</a>.
&#8220;The only felony of which we can be certain to come out of this Alvin Bragg prosecution in New York is the felony committed either by DA Bragg himself or someone on the grand jury that he&#8217;s using for this perversion of our justice system,&#8221; Ratcliffe told &#8220;Sunday Morning Futures&#8221; anchor Maria Bartiromo.
&#8220;The accused, Donald Trump, and his lawyers, don&#8217;t know what&#8217;s in this sealed indictment. But for the past, what? Seventy-two hours, the American public has been discussing supposedly 30 or 34 felony counts,&#8221; he added. &#8220;Leaking grand jury information is a felony. And so the only people capable of that would be Alvin Bragg&#8217;s team or members of the grand jury itself.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
DNI John Ratcliffe says that Alvin Bragg may have committed a felony. 
Leaking grand jury information is a felony and so the only people capable of that would be Alvin Bragg’s team or members of the grand jury itself.” 
Ready for the boomerang? <a href="https://t.co/kshBZVG0rA">pic.twitter.com/kshBZVG0rA</a>
&mdash; vanhoa (@vanhoa2272) <a href="https://twitter.com/vanhoa2272/status/1642545972546011138?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 2, 2023</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
<a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/30/politics/donald-trump-indictment/index.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">CNN</a> and <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/trump-arrested-news-updates-indictment-counts-new-york-rcna77595" target="_blank" rel="noopener">NBC News</a> each cited &#8220;two sources familiar&#8221; with the matter in reporting that Trump faces about 30 charges following the revelation on Thursday that Trump became the first former president to face criminal charges.
Though exact details about the indictment remain unclear, Trump&#8217;s attorney Joe Tacopina <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-attorney-says-he-doesnt-know-how-arraignment-will-go" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told ABC News</a> on Sunday he was certain they &#8220;revolved around&#8221; the documentation of hush money payments to adult film actress Stormy Daniels during the 2016 election cycle.
Ratcliffe isn&#8217;t the only person saying there could have been criminal leaks. Harvard Law professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz shared a similar view during an appearance on OANN, noting that such a <a href="https://casetext.com/statute/consolidated-laws-of-new-york/chapter-penal/part-3-specific-offenses/title-l-offenses-against-public-administration/article-215-other-offenses-relating-to-judicial-and-other-proceedings/section-21570-unlawful-grand-jury-disclosure" target="_blank" rel="noopener">violation of New York penal law</a> could warrant up to five years behind bars.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
There is a crime — illegal grand jury leaks from Bragg’s office! <a href="https://t.co/qHw20yK3s9">pic.twitter.com/qHw20yK3s9</a>
&mdash; Liz Harrington (@realLizUSA) <a href="https://twitter.com/realLizUSA/status/1641958897840709634?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 1, 2023</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Trump, who is months into his third campaign for president, claims he is the target of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-to-deliver-mar-a-lago-speech-after-arraignment" target="_blank" rel="noopener">“political persecution”</a> and denies any wrongdoing.
<a class="c-link c-link--focus-visible" href="https://onelink.to/dwapp" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-stringify-link="https://onelink.to/dwapp" data-sk="tooltip_parent" aria-describedby="sk-tooltip-10847">CLICK HERE TO GET THE DAILY WIRE APP</a>
Republicans in Congress have <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/house-republicans-launch-probe-into-manhattan-das-unprecedented-abuse-of-office-to-target-trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">opened an investigation</a> seeking documents and testimony from Bragg&#8217;s team. Bragg, a Democrat, responded by <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/bragg-accuses-gop-of-unlawful-political-interference-following-trump-indictment" target="_blank" rel="noopener">urging the GOP lawmakers</a> to back off and &#8220;let the criminal justice process proceed without unlawful political interference.&#8221;
Bragg&#8217;s office also <a href="https://twitter.com/ManhattanDA/status/1641579988360019968" target="_blank" rel="noopener">issued a brief statement</a> on Thursday saying the prosecutor&#8217;s team had been in contact with Trump&#8217;s legal counsel to coordinate about surrendering following the indictment.
The arraignment is set for Tuesday in New York. Trump&#8217;s <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-to-deliver-mar-a-lago-speech-after-arraignment" target="_blank" rel="noopener">re-election campaign announced</a> on Sunday the former president would deliver a public address from his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on Tuesday night.

Trump Spy Chief John Ratcliffe Flips Script, Says Indictment Leak Is A Crime

Trump Spy Chief Flips Script, Says Indictment Leak Is A Crime

Alvin Bragg

Crime

Donald Trump

Former Director of National Intelligence <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/john-ratcliffe" target="_blank" rel="noopener">John Ratcliffe</a> rejected the claim that three Chinese spy balloons &#8220;transited&#8221; the United States during Donald Trump&#8217;s presidency.
The suspected Chinese balloon that traversed across the lower 48 states before being shot down off the coast of the Carolinas on Saturday represented an &#8220;unprecedented national security blunder of incalculable damage,&#8221; Ratcliffe said during <a href="https://rumble.com/v28fmmk-john-ratcliffe-the-biden-administration-committed-an-unprecedented-blunder-.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">a Fox News interview</a> on Sunday.
Anchor Maria Bartiromo then asked Ratcliffe to respond to what she said was the Department of Defense claiming three Chinese spy balloons entered U.S. airspace during the Trump administration, they were not shot down, and they were not disclosed.
&#8220;It&#8217;s not true. I can refute it,&#8221; Ratcliffe responded. He said his view is backed by other Trump administration officials, including <a href="https://www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/suspected-chinese-balloon-over-us-02-04-23/h_1f1e4d057e1aa906e5ef3b686e63527b" target="_blank" rel="noopener">former Defense Secretary Mark Esper</a>, who said he does not recall Chinese surveillance balloons traversing the skies over the United States.
On Saturday, a <a href="https://www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/suspected-chinese-balloon-over-us-02-04-23/h_1f1e4d057e1aa906e5ef3b686e63527b" target="_blank" rel="noopener">senior U.S. defense official</a> said Chinese government surveillance balloons &#8220;transited the continental United States briefly at least three times during the prior administration and once that we know of at the beginning of this administration, but never for this duration of time,&#8221; according to CNN.
Ratcliffe insisted the American people can refute the Biden administration&#8217;s claim for themselves.
&#8220;Do you remember during the Trump administration when photographers on the ground and commercial airline pilots were talking about a spy balloon over the United States that people could look up and see even with the naked eye and that the media that hated Donald Trump wasn&#8217;t reporting? I don&#8217;t remember that either because it didn&#8217;t happen,&#8221; he said.
Trump himself <a href="https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/109812699029727017" target="_blank" rel="noopener">issued a denial</a> on his social media platform on Sunday.
&#8220;The Chinese Balloon situation is a disgrace, just like the Afghanistan horror show, and everything else surrounding the grossly incompetent Biden Administration,&#8221; Trump posted to Truth Social. &#8220;They are only good at cheating in elections, and disinformation — and now they are putting out that a Balloon was put up by China during the Trump Administration, in order to take the &#8216;heat&#8217; off the slow moving Biden fools. China had too much respect for &#8216;TRUMP&#8217; for this to have happened, and it NEVER did. JUST FAKE DISINFORMATION!&#8221;
The U.S. government first publicly <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/chinese-spy-balloon-hovering-over-united-states-report" target="_blank" rel="noopener">acknowledged a suspected reconnaissance balloon</a> on Thursday as it was spotted over Billings, Montana, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/what-we-know-about-the-suspected-chinese-spy-balloon-flying-over-united-states" target="_blank" rel="noopener">near a military base</a> that houses 150 Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missiles after it traveled above the Aleutian Islands and through Canada.
While China&#8217;s government claimed the balloon was a &#8220;civilian airship used for research, mainly meteorological purposes&#8221; and essentially got blown off course, the Pentagon rejected that explanation on Friday, calling it a &#8220;<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/suspected-chinese-spy-balloon-is-maneuverable-has-changed-direction-at-60000-feet-pentagon" target="_blank" rel="noopener">maneuverable</a>&#8221; surveillance balloon. The Pentagon also expressed concern that shooting the balloon down over land could create a debris field that would endanger people below.
The balloon was destroyed off the coast of South Carolina on Saturday, a moment caught on video. An F-22 Raptor shot down the balloon with one air-to-air A9X sidewinder missile, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/new-video-emerges-of-chinese-spy-balloon-being-shot-down" target="_blank" rel="noopener">according to a senior U.S. military official</a>. The Pentagon said a <a href="https://www.defense.gov/News/Transcripts/Transcript/Article/3288618/senior-defense-official-and-senior-military-official-hold-an-off-camera-on-back/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">recovery operation would follow</a>. China&#8217;s foreign ministry <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/04/us/politics/chinese-spy-balloon-shot-down.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">responded by condemning</a> the United States for &#8220;an excessive reaction that seriously violates international convention&#8221; and warned that Beijing &#8220;retains the right to respond further.&#8221;
Ratcliffe, a former U.S. congressman who served as the nation&#8217;s spy chief from May 2020 until the end of Trump&#8217;s administration in January 2021, called it an &#8220;incredibly successful intelligence operation&#8221; for China. He also said other foreign adversaries such as Iran, Russia, and North Korea are watching and likely &#8220;thrilled&#8221; by the possibilities this scenario presents them.

Ratcliffe Shoots Down Claim That Three Chinese Balloons Crossed Over U.S. Under Trump

Balloon

China

Communist China

Global Politics

National Security

Pentagon

Former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe warned during a Fox News interview over the weekend that a new UFO report released by the government showed an increase in unexplained sightings while containing one major glaring issue.
Ratcliffe noted that the increased number of sightings in the report indicates that U.S. Military pilots are being much more proactive in revealing what they see when they are up in the air.
However, Ratcliffe added that there appears to be technology that may be superior to what the U.S. Military has in its arsenal.
&#8220;I know everyone gets caught up on the alien life and all of that, but my concern as the director of national intelligence was, if anyone, foreign adversary, regardless of how you define foreign adversary, have technologies that the United States don&#8217;t have, we need to find out more about that,&#8221; he said.
Ratcliffe said the new reports have made it clear that there are hundreds of unexplained sightings where there is &#8220;no natural phenomenon involved.&#8221;
&#8220;There&#8217;s no visual disturbance, it&#8217;s not clutter, or debris, or birds or anything else,&#8221; he said. &#8220;But objects that demonstrate technologies that seem to defy the law of physics and capabilities that we don&#8217;t have as the world&#8217;s superpower, you know, our role in the federal government is to provide for the common defense. And we can&#8217;t do that if someone else has technologies that are better than we have.&#8221;
WATCH:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="Ratcliffe: Biden is now the DOJ&#039;s &#039;roadblock&#039; to prosecuting Trump" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/hSGF6yjJJjc?start=600&#038;feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen></iframe>
TRANSCRIPT (revised for clarity):
<blockquote>RACHEL CAMPOS-DUFFY, FOX NEWS: I want to move on to one other topic that&#8217;s very interesting. There have been an increase in UFO sightings in the past two years a US intelligence report is saying. You&#8217;ve pushed for more disclosures about UFO sightings when you were DNI, head of the DNI. I want to know about that. And I also want to know about if there&#8217;s any appetite in the government to finally release also the JFK files.
JOHN RATCLIFFE, FORMER DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: Well shortly after I became the DNI in June of 2020, I was the first one to publicly acknowledged that there was a unidentified aerial phenomenon taskforce through the Senate Intelligence Committee because I wanted there to be greater transparency to the American people about the number of sightings of things that are unexplained. 
And I know everyone gets caught up on the alien life and all of that. But my concern as the director of national intelligence was, if any one, foreign adversary, regardless of how you define foreign adversary, have technologies that the United States don&#8217;t have, we need to find out more about that. And what we found was that was Navy pilots and Air Force pilots were discouraged from reporting that, they thought that it would impair their careers. We need to have information if there are technologies out there, and very clearly, as this most recent report reveals, the sightings are increasing, which is a good thing, because that means we&#8217;re getting more honest reporting from our Navy and Air Force pilots. But it gives us more information, we need to find out when there are and there very clearly are now hundreds of unexplained sightings, meaning that there&#8217;s no natural phenomenon involved. There&#8217;s no visual disturbance, it&#8217;s not clutter, or debris, or birds or anything else. But objects that demonstrate technologies that seem to defy the law of physics and capabilities that we don&#8217;t have as the world&#8217;s superpower, you know, our role in the federal government is to provide for the common defense. And we can&#8217;t do that if someone else has technologies that are better than we have. So all of this is a very, you know, a good development from my perspective. And I&#8217;m glad that they&#8217;re pursuing some of the things that I was pushing as DNI.
Your second question with regard to other classified information. You know, I don&#8217;t want to disclose conversations with former President Trump, but he did want to declassify the documents surrounding the Kennedy assassination. And there was some pushback at different levels. And ultimately, he made the decision not to do it at that  period of time. But obviously, there&#8217;s there&#8217;s a lot of documentation out there of different things that I think the American people deserve to know about. </blockquote>
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ufo-reports-from-u-s-military-are-increasing">UFO Reports From U.S. Military Are Increasing</a>

Key Speakers At America First Agenda Summit

Former National Intelligence Director John Ratcliffe Sounds Alarm Over New UFO Report

Air and Space

U.S.

No one in the U.S. intelligence community had authorization to claim the Hunter Biden laptop story was part of a Russian disinformation plot, a top official from the Trump administration said on Sunday.
In an interview in which he discussed <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/the-fourth-installment-of-the-twitter-files-is-released" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> &#8220;The Twitter Files,&#8221;</a> former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe insisted there was only one reason why a member of his office would be in contact with Twitter in the run-up to the 2020 presidential election as described in the messages.
Such a meeting would need approval from former President Donald Trump&#8217;s National Security Council and would be part of a &#8220;coordinated process&#8221; to provide election security briefings to &#8220;groups&#8221; of private companies or state election officials, Ratcliffe told host Maria Bartiromo on Fox News&#8217;s &#8220;Sunday Morning Futures.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
.<a href="https://twitter.com/JohnRatcliffe?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@JohnRatcliffe</a> response to the Twitter file release from <a href="https://twitter.com/mtaibbi?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@mtaibbi</a>.<a href="https://twitter.com/JohnRatcliffe?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@JohnRatcliffe</a> tells <a href="https://twitter.com/MariaBartiromo?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@MariaBartiromo</a> the only reason the DNI would be meeting with twitter. <a href="https://t.co/F3PP5ksLPl">pic.twitter.com/F3PP5ksLPl</a>
&mdash; The Dirty Truth (Josh) (@AKA_RealDirty) <a href="https://twitter.com/AKA_RealDirty/status/1601964000623071232?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 11, 2022</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
&#8220;None of those meetings, Maria, would have had anything to do with content moderation, much less anything to do with specifically&#8221; any warnings about the Hunter Biden laptop being part of a Russian disinformation effort, he said. &#8220;There never would have been any authority or reason for anyone within the intelligence community to be saying anything otherwise.&#8221;
Ratcliffe is a former Republican congressman from Texas who Trump picked to take over the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) in 2020. In that role, Ratcliffe oversaw the agencies of the intelligence community. This includes the FBI and Homeland Security Department, agencies that, along with DNI, met with Twitter about &#8220;election security,&#8221; according to a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/musk-releases-hunter-biden-files-tweets-deleted-at-behest-of-team-biden-exec-was-key-behind-censorship-decision" target="_blank" rel="noopener">post revealed by journalist Matt Taibbi</a>.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
20. This post about the Hunter Biden laptop situation shows that Roth not only met weekly with the FBI and DHS, but with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI): <a href="https://t.co/s5IiUjQqIY">pic.twitter.com/s5IiUjQqIY</a>
&mdash; Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) <a href="https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601364807831425025?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 9, 2022</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Reporting about the laptop started in October 2020, during the final weeks of the presidential election cycle when Hunter&#8217;s father, Joe Biden, was running for the White House. Much of the laptop&#8217;s contents, which included details about Hunter’s business dealings, drug use, and sex life, have since been <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/03/30/hunter-biden-laptop-data-examined/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">analyzed and shown to be authentic</a>. But at the time of the laptop&#8217;s emergence, social media companies, including Twitter, took steps to temporarily suppress the spread of the story, leading to claims of improper election influence by former President Donald Trump and his allies.
Ratcliffe said his <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/ratcliffe-hunter-biden-laptop-emails-not-russian-disinformation-campaign" target="_blank" rel="noopener">assertion back in October 2020</a> that the laptop was not part of a Russian disinformation campaign, as suggested in <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/kevin-mccarthy-vows-subpoenas-for-51-intel-veterans-in-hunter-biden-probe" target="_blank" rel="noopener">a letter signed by 51 former intelligence officials</a>, was &#8220;the official position of the intelligence community&#8221; and &#8220;has never been changed, even to this day.&#8221;
Republicans in Congress are <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/incoming-gop-chairman-sends-warning-shot-to-all-twitter-employees-tied-to-hunter-biden-laptop-controversy" target="_blank" rel="noopener">gearing up for a Hunter Biden investigation</a> with control of the House next year. Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), who is positioned to become House speaker, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/kevin-mccarthy-vows-subpoenas-for-51-intel-veterans-in-hunter-biden-probe" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said Republicans would subpoena</a> the dozens of intelligence veterans who signed onto the letter warning the laptop story “has all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation.”
Decrying what he labeled a &#8220;domestic disinformation campaign,&#8221; Ratcliffe said one line of inquiry that needs to be pursued relates to former top FBI lawyer James Baker, who as Twitter’s deputy general counsel, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/top-fbi-lawyer-turned-twitter-counsel-supported-decision-to-suppress-hunter-biden-laptop-story-report" target="_blank" rel="noopener">appeared to support</a> the social media site’s move to suppress the New York Post’s reporting on Hunter Biden’s laptop. This disclosure in The Twitter Files led Twitter CEO Elon Musk to <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/the-twitter-files-compromised-after-lawyer-involved-in-the-controversy-was-behind-vetting-the-files" target="_blank" rel="noopener">fire Baker</a>.
&#8220;One of the things that needs to be determined is what was [Baker&#8217;s] relationship with Twitter before he got to Twitter, and was he sharing information as the FBI general counsel to the benefit of one political party, to the detriment of another, that then continued when he got to Twitter?&#8221; Ratcliffe said.

Ratcliffe Says Only One Reason Why Official From Top Spy Office Met With Twitter

2020 Election

Elections

Hunter Biden

laptop computer

New York Post

odni

Twitter

Former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe reacted to Twitter&#8217;s release of internal company documents late last week by saying that one of the key players in the social media company&#8217;s decision to suppress the Hunter Biden laptop story in 2020 is &#8220;the Michael Phelps of gold medal winning performances when it comes to election interference.&#8221;
Ratcliffe made the remarks during an interview on Fox News Sunday night with Trey Gowdy.
Musk released internal company communications through journalist Matt Taibbi about the company’s censorship of the story and about how the company removed tweets at the behest of the Democratic Party, a decision that he made because he said it was “necessary to restore public trust” in the platform.
&#8220;Do you happen to remember, there was a letter signed by some so-called national security and intelligence officials warning that the Hunter Biden laptop might be Russian disinformation?&#8221; Gowdy asked. &#8220;Do you recall that?&#8221;
<a class="c-link" tabindex="-1" href="https://get.dailywire.com/subscribe/plus?utm_campaign=dwplus&amp;utm_medium=editorial&amp;utm_source=dwsite&amp;cid=dwplus&amp;mid=z&amp;xid=0" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-stringify-link="https://get.dailywire.com/subscribe/plus?utm_campaign=dwplus&amp;utm_medium=editorial&amp;utm_source=dwsite&amp;cid=dwplus&amp;mid=z&amp;xid=0" data-sk="tooltip_parent" data-remove-tab-index="true">TIRED OF THE LEGACY MEDIA&#8217;S BIAS CONTROLLING THE NARRATIVE AND OBSCURING THE TRUTH? JOIN US AND SAVE 30%.</a>
&#8220;Yeah. So, Trey, as you know, not just me, but the Attorney General and the FBI director, we all put out statements back in October of 2020, alerting the American people that the Hunter Biden laptop was not Russian disinformation,&#8221; Ratcliffe responded. &#8220;And we did that, because we wanted the American people to be aware of the issues as they as they came up to an election, to be fully informed. And unfortunately, what we are seeing through what&#8217;s happened with Elon Musk and the Twitter files, is that the truth about this issue was suppressed and lies were amplified and lies in the form of election interference from the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff, who said this was Russian disinformation and coordinated with former intelligence officials to amplify that lie through social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook.&#8221;
When asked about a Twitter employee James Baker&#8217;s role in all of this and whether it was the same James Baker who was at the FBI, Ratcliffe confirmed that it was the same person.
&#8220;So, the same James Baker that, to remind your viewers was general counsel for Jim Comey at the FBI, who helped write an exoneration memo for Hillary Clinton before she was ever interviewed by the FBI for having hundreds of classified emails on her server, that same James Baker then met with the Clinton campaign officials to hand carry evidence, supposed evidence about Russian collusion, the Steele dossier, the Alpha bank connections with the Trump campaign into the FBI and the Department of Justice to launch an investigation that went on for years,&#8221; Ratcliffe said. &#8220;That&#8217;s the same James Baker that ultimately at Twitter said statements from the FBI, the Department of Justice, and the Director of National Intelligence that say this is not Russian disinformation, apparently aren&#8217;t clear enough, and we need to suppress this.&#8221;
&#8220;So yeah, I think these Twitter files are revealing that you know, James Baker is the the Michael Phelps of gold medal winning performances when it comes to election interference,&#8221; he added.
WATCH:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="John Ratcliffe: The threat from China becomes greater as time goes by" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/E5uInbklMi8?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>
TRANSCRIPT:
<blockquote>TREY GOWDY: Welcome back to Sunday Night in America. The threat from China is not going away. Our next guest warned us of that two years ago. What can or should be done about China? And do you remember the Hunter Biden laptop? Some self identified national security experts said it might be Russian disinformation. Turns out it was just liberal Twitter employees trying to help a Democrat win the presidency. So that&#8217;s our choice, Russian disinformation or electioneering by Twitter lawyers? Joining us now is the former Director of National Intelligence, a former congressman from the great state of Texas and a former United States Attorney, John Lee Ratcliffe. Director, let&#8217;s start with China. What concerns you the most? What&#8217;s the latest? What should our viewers be looking out for as it relates to China?
JOHN RATCLIFFE, FORMER DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: Well, I would say, Trey, that we should be most concerned about the Biden foreign policy approach to our nation&#8217;s number one adversary. Look, you&#8217;ve mentioned the op-ed that I wrote two years ago, if anything, I underestimated the level and timing of China&#8217;s aggression. I mean, look, just four months ago, we had the Chinese Communist Party state-run media advocating to shoot down the plane carrying the Speaker of the House and members of Congress if they dared land on the island of Taiwan more than more than 100 miles from China&#8217;s border. You know, China views us as an enemy or an adversary and, you know, the the current administration keeps referring to China as a competitor. And you know, until we start to take this seriously and project strength, you know, the threat of China is going to continue to get greater as time goes by.
GOWDY: All right, Director, I want to switch gears: Do you happen to remember, there was a letter signed by some so-called national security and intelligence officials warning that the Hunter Biden laptop might be Russian disinformation? Do you recall that?
RATCLIFFE: Yeah. So, Trey, as you know, not just me, but the Attorney General and the FBI director, we all put out statements back in October of 2020, alerting the American people that the Hunter Biden laptop was not Russian disinformation. And we did that, because we wanted the American people to be aware of the issues as they as they came up to an election, to be fully informed. And unfortunately, what we are seeing through what&#8217;s happened with Elon Musk and the Twitter files, is that the truth about this issue was suppressed and lies were amplified and lies in the form of election interference from the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff, who said this was Russian disinformation and coordinated with former intelligence officials to amplify that lie through social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook.
GOWDY: All right. So, director, when you said it was not Russian disinformation, all right, and the FBI backed you up when you said that, you&#8217;re the head of the intelligence community and you said, &#8216;hey, look, no offense to Adam Schiff. This is not Russian disinformation&#8217;, the FBI backs you up. In some articles that I read, there was a Twitter employee by the name of James Baker that was involved in the decision making to kind of suppress that content. There was also an FBI General Counsel named James Baker, that could not possibly be the same one could it?
RATCLIFFE: Oh, you know, it is Trey. So the same James Baker that, to remind your viewers was general counsel for Jim Comey at the FBI, who helped write an exoneration memo for Hillary Clinton before she was ever interviewed by the FBI for having hundreds of classified emails on her server, that same James Baker then met with the Clinton campaign officials to hand carry evidence, supposed evidence about Russian collusion, the Steele dossier, the Alpha bank connections with the Trump campaign into the FBI and the Department of Justice to launch an investigation that went on for years. That&#8217;s the same James Baker that ultimately at Twitter said statements from the FBI, the Department of Justice, and the Director of National Intelligence that say this is not Russian disinformation, apparently aren&#8217;t clear enough, and we need to suppress this. So yeah, I think these Twitter files are revealing that you know, James Baker is the the Michael Phelps of gold medal winning performances when it comes to election interference.
Related: <a href="https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/3230682/china-military-power-report-examines-changes-in-beijings-strategy/">Pentagon: China Blitzed Past U.S. Estimates For Nuclear Buildup, Could Have 1,000 Warheads By 2030</a></blockquote>

Former DNI John Ratcliffe On ‘Twitter Files’: James Baker An Olympic Champ On Interfering In Elections

Big Tech

Trey Gowdy

John Ratcliffe, who served as Director of National Intelligence in the Trump administration, lashed out at FBI Director Christopher Wray after the FBI’s raid on former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home.
Prior to serving at National Intelligence, Ratcliffe served as a Texas GOP Congressman, during which time he questioned Wray when he testified before the House Judiciary Committee about the FBI’s surveillance of Carter Page. Wray took over as head of the FBI in August 2017 after former Director James Comey was fired.
On Tuesday, after the revelation of the FBI raid, Ratcliffe tweeted, “Wray already admitted that the FBI fraudulently obtained multiple warrants to illegally spy on Trump as a candidate and during presidency. If yet another FBI warrant to raid Trump’s home doesn’t stand up to scrutiny, Wray may be the last FBI Director.”
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
Wray already admitted that the FBI fraudulently obtained multiple warrants to illegally spy on Trump as as a candidate and during presidency. If yet another FBI warrant to raid Trump’s home doesn’t stand up to scrutiny, Wray may be the last FBI Director <a href="https://t.co/Xv4hRDmiFs">https://t.co/Xv4hRDmiFs</a>
&mdash; John Ratcliffe (@JohnRatcliffe) <a href="https://twitter.com/JohnRatcliffe/status/1556983137523142656?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 9, 2022</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
In 2020, Wray, appearing before the House Judiciary Committee, acknowledged that the Justice Department and the FBI illegally surveilled Trump foreign policy adviser Carter Page. Ratcliffe asked him about the FBI’s response to the report from Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz, who had slammed the DOJ and FBI for 17 &#8220;<a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/fbi-review-indicates-carter-page-fisa-was-especially-problematic">significant errors and omissions</a>&#8221; regarding secret surveillance court filings targeting Page.
The filings depended on the dossier created by British ex-spy Christopher Steele, “who’d been hired by Fusion GPS, which in turn was hired by the Hillary Clinton campaign through the Perkins Coie law firm,” <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/fbi-director-carter-page-was-surveilled-illegally">The Washington Examiner</a> noted.
Wray stated to Ratcliffe,  “Political bias has no place in today’s FBI.”
Judge James Boasberg, the FISA court’s presiding judge, had noted that the DOJ acknowledged there “was insufficient predication to establish probable cause to believe that [Carter] Page was acting as an agent of a foreign power.”
Ratcliffe pointed out that the IG report acknowledged, as did the Department of Justice and the FISA report, that there was illegal surveillance with respect to at least several of the FISA applications targeting Page, because there was not probable cause or proper predication.
Ratcliffe turned to Wray, “Correct?”
“Right,” Wray admitted. “We have accepted every finding in the Inspector General’s report.”
Ratcliffe contended that the Obama administration had “weaponized the FBI for political motivation and purposes. I just wonder whether or not you’re going to be able to put the genie back in the bottle.”

FBI Director Wray Testifies Before Senate Judiciary Committee

‘Wray May Be The Last FBI Director’: Former Director Of National Intelligence

Christopher Wray

Mar-a-Lago

Correction: A previous version of this article, based on an incorrect report, stated that Special Counsel John Durham used the word &#8220;infiltrate&#8221; to describe the actions. The filing used the word &#8220;exploited.&#8221;
Then-Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe told Special Counsel John Durham in meetings that there was &#8220;enough evidence&#8221; to indict &#8220;multiple people&#8221; in his criminal investigation into the origins of FBI&#8217;s Trump-Russia probe.
&#8220;Sources told Fox News this week that during his meetings with Durham, Ratcliffe, who served as a congressman and as the former U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Texas, said he believed there was &#8216;enough evidence,'&#8221; in nearly 1,000 pages of material that Ratcliffe turned over to the Justice Department &#8220;to indict &#8216;multiple people,'&#8221; Fox News <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/dni-ratcliffe-durham-intelligence-indictments-fbi-trump-russia-probe">reported</a>.
The report centered around a report from 2020 about how the CIA forwarded an investigative referral to the FBI regarding allegations that Hillary Clinton had approved &#8220;a plan concerning U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russian hackers hampering U.S. elections as a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server.&#8221;
“Ratcliffe declassified Brennan’s handwritten notes – which were taken after he briefed Obama on the intelligence the CIA received – and a CIA memo, which revealed that officials referred the matter to the FBI for potential investigative action,” Fox News <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/dni-brennan-notes-cia-memo-clinton">reported</a> in 2020. “That referral was sent to then-FBI Director James Comey and then-Deputy Assistant Director of Counterintelligence Peter Strzok.”
The news follows an explosive report from over the weekend that detailed the latest developments in Durham&#8217;s investigation, which had been slowed down due to the pandemic.
Durham <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/bombshell-clinton-campaign-paid-tech-company-to-infiltrate-trump-tower-white-house-servers-durham-says">said</a> in a new court filing that operatives linked to Hillary Clinton&#8217;s failed presidential campaign &#8220;exploited&#8221; Internet data linked to Trump Tower and the Executive Office of the President in an effort to establish a “narrative” linking President Donald Trump to Russia.
The revelation was made in a court filing late last week that centered on potential conflicts of interest connected to the representation of former Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussman, who has been charged with allegedly lying to the FBI.
Fox News <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/clinton-campaign-paid-infiltrate-trump-tower-white-house-servers">reported</a>:
<blockquote>The indictment against Sussman says he told then-FBI General Counsel James Baker in September 2016, less than two months before the 2016 presidential election, that he was not doing work “for any client” when he requested and held a meeting in which he presented “purported data and ‘white papers’ that allegedly demonstrated a covert communications channel” between the Trump Organization and Alfa Bank, which has ties to the Kremlin.
But Durham’s filing on Feb. 11, in a section titled “Factual Background,” reveals that Sussman “had assembled and conveyed the allegations to the FBI on behalf of at least two specific clients, including a technology executive (Tech Executive 1) at a U.S.-based internet company (Internet Company 1) and the Clinton campaign.”</blockquote>
The filing says that Sussman and the tech executive had met and been in contact with another lawyer who was working for the Clinton campaign.
The filing says that during the summer of 2016, the tech executive worked with Sussman, an investigative firm retained by a law firm on behalf of the Clinton campaign, and employees at tech companies to gather “data.”
“In connection with these efforts, Tech Executive-1 exploited his access to non-public and/or proprietary Internet data,” the filing states. “Tech Executive-1 also enlisted the assistance of researchers at a U.S.-based university who were receiving and analyzing large amounts of Internet data in connection with a pending federal government cybersecurity research contract.”
“Tech Executive-1 tasked these researchers to mine Internet data to establish ‘an inference’ and ‘narrative’ tying then-candidate Trump to Russia,” Durham states. “In doing so, Tech Executive-1 indicated that he was seeking to please certain ‘VIPs,’ referring to individuals at Law Firm-1 and the Clinton campaign.”
Fox News added:
<blockquote>Durham also writes that during Sussman’s trial, the government will establish that among the Internet data Tech Executive-1 and his associates exploited was domain name system (DNS) internet traffic pertaining to “(i) a particular healthcare provider, (ii) Trump Tower, (iii) Donald Trump’s Central Park West apartment building, and (iv) the Executive Office of the President of the United States (EOP).”</blockquote>
The tech company that the tech executive worked for “had come to access and maintain dedicated servers” for the Executive Office of the President as “part of a sensitive arrangement whereby it provided DNS resolution services to the EOP,” the filing said. “Tech Executive-1 and his associates exploited this arrangement by mining the EOP’s DNS traffic and other data for the purpose of gathering derogatory information about Donald Trump.”
The Daily Wire’s first original film, Shut In, has made its cinematic debut, being met with rave reviews. The Daily Wire is building an alternative to the leftist entertainment industry, one gripping movie at a time. Join us in this mission and stream Shut In today by becoming a Daily Wire <a class="in-cell-link" href="https://www.dailywire.com/subscribe" target="_blank" rel="noopener">member</a>.

John Durham

Then-Director Of National Intelligence To Special Counsel Durham: ‘Enough Evidence’ To Indict ‘Multiple People’

Hillary Clinton

Former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe told Fox News host Maria Bartiromo on Sunday that the Biden administration&#8217;s move to buy Chinese drones for federal law enforcement was perplexing and that the move jeopardized U.S. national security.
Ratcliffe noted that the Trump administration flagged the specific Chinese company in question over what it said was &#8220;moderate confidence&#8221; that the Chinese company was providing information on U.S. critical infrastructure to the Chinese Communist Party.
&#8220;Like so much that Biden administration has done on national security lately, this makes very little sense,&#8221; Ratcliffe said. &#8220;It&#8217;s harmful to our national security. And also, Chinese drone technology is not as good as U.S. drone technology. So it&#8217;s hard to make sense out of what&#8217;s doing this, other than it is consistent with the Biden administration taking a softer approach, trying to promote a false narrative that somehow China is a competitor and not an adversary.&#8221;
WATCH:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
Former DNI Director John Ratcliffe: Biden admin is undoing the Trump admin&#39;s work tackling the threat of China. Now, the US is buying drones from the Chinese, which is &quot;harmful to our national security.&quot; Biden treats US parents as more threatening than Chinese spies, he says. <a href="https://t.co/PCq1hUmUmE">pic.twitter.com/PCq1hUmUmE</a>
&mdash; Jason Rantz on KTTH Radio (@jasonrantz) <a href="https://twitter.com/jasonrantz/status/1447360847626395648?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 11, 2021</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
TRANSCRIPT:
<blockquote>MARIA BARTIROMO, FOX NEWS HOST: My next guest warned the administration against emboldening China on his way out the door, but was ignored. John Ratcliffe is the former Director of National Intelligence. He joins me now. Good to see you. So nice to have you, John, thanks for being here. Is the U.S. buying drones from China?
JOHN RATCLIFFE, FORMER DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: Yeah, those reports are accurate as reflected, the Biden administration, through the FBI and Secret Service purchased from DJI, which is a company that the Trump administration actually flagged in 2017, Department of Homeland Security said that that specific company was using its drones for the purpose of providing information on U.S. critical infrastructure to the Chinese Communist Party. And that was moderate confidence that that was taking place, which is why our administration took all of those out and basically advanced a policy where we wouldn&#8217;t use that Chinese technology, you outline the kind of concerns that Huawei and companies that are controlled by the Chinese Communist Party pose to our national security. So, like so much that Biden administration has done on national security lately, this makes very little sense. It&#8217;s harmful to our national security. And also, Chinese drone technology is not as good as U.S. drone technology. So it&#8217;s hard to make sense out of what&#8217;s doing this, other than it is consistent with the Biden administration taking a softer approach, trying to promote a false narrative that somehow China is a competitor and not an adversary. And you would think that the lessons learned from COVID would teach everyone that, you know, China&#8217;s not to be trusted, and that moves like this are harmful to our national security posture.
BARTIROMO: This morning, I saw a report, illegal alien from China hit with federal charges for allegedly setting fire to historic Alabama church. I mean, all of that work that your administration did in terms of confronting the China threat. There&#8217;s a list of indictments that we have here, and this is only a handful of them from 2020. The list is long. In terms of the crackdown on Chinese espionage. Everybody from the University of Arkansas Professor indicted for wire and passport fraud to that the head of the biology department at Harvard who were being paid to send information back to China. We haven&#8217;t seen any indictments under Joe Biden. Has the Espionage threat gone away? Or are their spies right now in the United States, and particularly in Wall Street firms from your standpoint?
RATCLIFFE: Well, absolutely, in fact, to that point, Maria, I went to Capitol Hill as the Director of National Intelligence last year to brief Congress on those efforts, and particularly on China&#8217;s efforts to target members of Congress at a rate of six times greater than any other country. And you&#8217;re familiar with Chinese spies and relationship with California congressman Eric Swalwell. So you know, the idea that that all suddenly stopped, is, you know, nonsensical. The reason you&#8217;re not seeing this is, you know, the Department of Justice gets what it focuses on. And right now, very clearly, the Biden Department of Justice and law enforcement think that American parents are terrorists and not, you know, Chinese espionage agents that are very clearly not just in Washington, D.C., but as you said, in Wall Street, this narrative of China as a noble strategic competitor, you know, as Wall Street banks are selling trillions of dollars in debt and equities in Chinese companies to U.S. investors and retirees. There are so many both in Washington and in Wall Street that don&#8217;t want China to be the bad guy. And as I said before, recent events around the world that resulted in the deaths of 4 million people worldwide at the hands of the Chinese Communist Party through COVID, you know, should teach a lesson that China&#8217;s not to be trusted, particularly with regard to national security. </blockquote>

Rep. John Ratcliffe

Ex-Director Of National Intelligence Sounds Alarm On Biden Policy: ‘This Makes Very Little Sense’

Former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe told Fox News host Mark Levin on Sunday night that President Joe Biden, a Democrat, is the greatest threat that the United States faces from a national security perspective because of the numerous bad decisions that the administration has made.
Levin highlighted the recent disaster caused in Afghanistan by Biden and asked, &#8220;What has Joe Biden done to America&#8217;s national security?&#8221;
&#8220;To your point, first on Afghanistan, I hope that it&#8217;s just something that has an impact for decades, I hope it&#8217;s not centuries; it&#8217;s the most profound loss for the United States, certainly in our lifetime,&#8221; Ratcliffe said. &#8220;But one of my concerns there, and this goes to your larger question about what has Joe Biden done to our national security, he&#8217;s very currently harmed, but in so many respects beyond Afghanistan, but this most recent, most painful, colossal, epic failure in Afghanistan has literally breathed life into the radical Islamic terrorist movement, not just in Afghanistan, but around the world.&#8221;
Ratcliffe warned that U.S. intelligence officials will not know how bad the consequences of Biden&#8217;s actions are going for &#8220;a long, long time to come.&#8221;
&#8220;I wrote an article as the Director of National Intelligence saying that China was our number one national security threat; I did that as I was walking out the door based on the &#8230;. fact that, you know, I&#8217;m the person that saw more intelligence than anyone else in the country over the past year, and China very much is that existential threat to our country,&#8221; Ratcliffe continued. &#8220;But if I had to write that op-ed today, I would tell you that I think our greatest national security threat, at least in the short term, is Joe Biden, and our national security apparatus.&#8221;
&#8220;And the reason I say that, and I&#8217;m not trying to be glib or hyperbolic, but Mark, they have literally gotten everything wrong for eight straight months,&#8221; Ratcliffe explained. &#8220;With respect to China, with respect to Russia, with respect to Iran, with respect throughout the Middle East, now, including Afghanistan, it goes on and on, literally, they&#8217;re batting zero. They&#8217;re striking out at every turn. And it&#8217;s having a profound grave impact on our national security and our national security posture.&#8221;
Ratcliffe opined that America&#8217;s national security posture is weaker with respect to China, Russia, Iran, and Islamic terrorists because of Biden.
&#8220;I always look at what the intelligence, what I saw in that position, and one of the challenges here that we are facing for the next three years, is a president who&#8217;s not listening to the intelligence; our intelligence was crystal clear about what was going to happen in Afghanistan if we withdrew without conditions-based terms that we had negotiated and when Biden abandoned that plan; it went exactly to what we said was going to happen and that is unfortunately a trend that has continued where this administration and this national security apparatus keeps making bad decisions; keeps ignoring the actual intelligence that we have,&#8221; he added. &#8220;And honestly, nothing concerns me more right now.&#8221;
Ratcliffe noted that Biden&#8217;s disaster in Afghanistan was &#8221; demonstrating cowardice on the [inter]national stage to our allies and to our adversaries.&#8221;
In explaining how Biden has damaged America&#8217;s national security, Ratcliffe said, &#8220;How do you think our intelligence is going to work in the Middle East and in other places around the world, when we rely so much on human intelligence sources, people who work with the United States knowing that they will be shielded from and have the protection of the United States at the end of the day, when they watch the people that have worked with us in Afghanistan for the last few years be beheaded in front of their families?&#8221;
&#8220;So you know, our ability to even conduct the best intelligence around the world has been impacted,&#8221; he said.
Ratcliffe warned that while America is the greatest country in the world that there are people inside the U.S. that are working to destroy it.

US-ATTACKS-9/11-ANNIVERSARY

Former Director Of National Intelligence: Joe Biden Is ‘Greatest National Security Threat’ We Face

Former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe criticized President Joe Biden (D) during an interview on Sunday when asked about Biden&#8217;s recent meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
&#8220;Vladimir Putin got exactly what he wanted,&#8221; Ratcliffe told Fox News host Maria Bartiromo. &#8220;I could make an argument that the first five months of the Biden administration have been the best of Vladimir Putin&#8217;s political life.&#8221;
&#8220;Just from an economic standpoint, folks know that Vladimir Putin was 3-0 when it comes to pipelines,&#8221; Ratcliffe said. &#8220;Joe Biden shut down the Keystone pipeline. That was a win for Putin. Criminal networks in Russia shut down one of our major pipelines, the Colonial Pipeline. That was a win for Putin. And, of course, Joe Biden responded by giving Vladimir Putin the one thing that he wanted most, which was the Nord Stream II pipeline, the ability to finish that, and, by doing so, to control the flow of energy into Western Europe.&#8221;
&#8220;So it had already been a great year for Vladimir Putin before he ever got to Geneva,&#8221; Ratcliffe continued. &#8220;But then Joe Biden gave him a political win. He invited the Russian dictator who governs a country with an economy &#8212; a small, dwindling economy the size of the state of Texas, to sit down with him. And, as a result of that, Vladimir Putin was on the world stage with equal billing with the leader of the free world, and he made no concessions. He made no concessions about cyberattacks. He made no concessions about political dissidents. He made no concessions about Russian interference in Ukraine or Belarus. And that&#8217;s a political win for Vladimir Putin back home that he could not possibly have dreamed about.&#8221;
Ratcliffe said that the United States &#8220;got nothing&#8221; from the summit under Biden&#8217;s weak leadership.
&#8220;[Putin] also got a strategic win. He, Vladimir Putin got something that the American people haven&#8217;t gotten. He&#8217;s had for hours with Joe Biden and an ability to conduct really a physical and mental assessment, evaluation and differential diagnosis,&#8221; Ratcliffe continued. &#8220;And why that&#8217;s important, Maria, as intelligence professionals, when it comes to foreign leaders, whether it&#8217;s videos or pictures, I mean, we look at every tick, every tremor, every bobble. Is his hand shaking. Is that a spot on his neck? Did he just slur his words? Because that&#8217;s important.&#8221;
&#8220;You want to know the abilities or capabilities or limitations of foreign leaders. And, in this case, Vladimir Putin, as you said, a former KGB spy, a seasoned intelligence officer, had four hours directly with Joe Biden, Joe Biden, someone who we all know fell up a flight of stairs for no apparent reason twice, someone who couldn&#8217;t remember the name of his own secretary of defense, couldn&#8217;t remember the name of the Pentagon, and someone who has uttered more incomprehensible words and sentences than any American would care to admit.&#8221;
&#8220;So, Russia came in with some kind of a diagnosis, but Vladimir Putin had an opportunity to either confirm that or modify that. And he very much would have been looking for that over that four-hour period,&#8221; Ratcliffe continued. &#8220;Did Joe Biden remember what he said at the end of the meeting that he said at the beginning of the meeting? The other thing that he would have had an advantage in that four-hour period is to determine whether or not Joe Biden runs his staff or Joe Biden&#8217;s staff runs him.&#8221;
Ratcliffe also hammered Biden for claiming that he gave Biden a list of 16 items that were off limits to cyberattacks, saying that the move was &#8220;bizarre&#8221; and &#8220;absurd.&#8221;
&#8220;To hand him that kind of list is essentially to hand him a target list, to give your adversary, whatever you do, don&#8217;t attack these. These are where we&#8217;re most vulnerable, so stay away from that,&#8221; Ratcliffe concluded on the matter. &#8220;I mean, that&#8217;s how Vladimir Putin would look at that. I don&#8217;t know who&#8217;s coming up with the strategies. But if you&#8217;re going to give Vladimir Putin a list, it should have been a list of our targets. It should have been, hey, if we suffer another major cyberattack, we&#8217;re coming after one of these, or, even better, shut down the lights in the Kremlin before you go to the summit, so that Vladimir Putin knows you mean business and that when you say, don&#8217;t cross these red lines, or there will be consequences, he knows that you&#8217;re serious about that.&#8221;
WATCH:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="Former Director of National Intelligence, John Ratcliffe joined Maria Bartiromo on Fox" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/mIFG6B_pFKk?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

President Biden Speaks On Country’s COVID-19 Response And The Vaccination Effort

Former Director Of National Intelligence Rates Biden’s Performance With Putin. It’s Not Good.

Vladimir Putin

Menu