The top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee said Tuesday it is “deeply disturbing” that President Trump is trying to out the whistleblower at the center of the Ukraine complaint and called on intelligence officials to protect their identity.

“The president’s comments about ‘spies and treason’ and ‘what we used to do in the old days’ are downright dangerous and will do serious damage to our national security long after this news cycle is over,” said Sen. Mark Warner, Virginia Democrat. “That kind of rhetoric can only serve one purpose: intimidation of this whistleblower and anyone else within the intelligence community who is considering stepping forward to report wrongdoing.”

Mr. Trump on Monday said he was trying to find out the identity of the whistleblower who filed the complaint over Mr. Trump’s phone call with Ukraine’s president. Mr. Trump last week said the person behind the complaint was “close to a spy.”

“You know what we used to do in the old days when we were smart with spies and treason, right?” Mr. Trump said at the United States Mission to the United Nations on Thursday. “We used to handle it a little differently than we do now.”

On Tuesday, Mr. Warner urged acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire and leaders of the intelligence community to “publicly pledge” to “protect and stand by this whistleblower, and any other individual within the intelligence community who steps forward to lawfully report illegal or unethical behavior within the federal government, anonymously or otherwise.”

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