In a Wednesday move that was both praised and criticized, President Trump revoked the Top Secret security clearance for Obama-era CIA director and major Trump-critic John Brennan. The former spook is now an NBC News analyst, so the network didn’t take too kindly to their guy losing the mighty privilege he was granted.

As would be expected, the loss of Brennan’s security clearance was the first thing anchor Lester Holt got to during NBC Nightly News. “It looks a lot like payback tonight for some former senior government officials who have spoken out against President Trump,” he bitterly declared. “The President yanking the security clearance for former CIA boss John Brennan today accusing him of using his access to ‘sow division and chaos’ at the White House.”

“Unprecedented,” White House correspondent Kristen Welker proclaimed at the start of her report. “President Trump tonight revoking the security clearance of one of his harshest critics, career intelligence official and former CIA Director John Brennan, who’s also an NBC News analyst.” Of course, she omitted how under his leadership the CIA spied on U.S. Senators and hacked their computers, then lied about it under oath.

Welker then asserted that Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders “accused Brennan of erratic behavior and abusing access without offering evidence.” Yet, she then played a clip of the Press Secretary laying out the reasoning being the move:

Mr. Brennan has recently leveraged his status as a former high-ranking official with access to highly sensitive information to make a series of unfounded and outrageous allegations, wild outbursts on the internet and television about this administration.

If that wasn’t enough to discredit her own suggestion, Welker boasted about how her colleague Brennan “has called Mr. Trump everything from a traitor to a danger to the country, and responded forceful tonight.” So, what’s so hard to understand?

Via clips from the White House Press Briefing, Welker tried to claim that revoking Brennan’s security clearance was somehow an infringement on his First Amendment rights. “These people were being singled out to have either clearances revoked or in the process of being revoked; to me smacks of Nixonian-type practices of trying to silence anyone who’s willing to criticize this president,” huffed Virginia Democratic Senator Mark Warner in another soundbite.

Pushing pure speculation as to why the President decided that Wednesday was the day to pull the trigger on something the White House threatened last month, Welker suggested it was all just a big distraction. “So why now? Well, the White House won't say but officials here are eager to turn the page on multiple controversies,” She argued while wearing a scowl. “Mr. Trump's former adviser Omarosa accusing him of using the 'N-word' and his former campaign chair on trial.”

It’s easy to understand why NBC would be so furious over Brennan losing his security clearance, it was an investment by the network. Don’t take my word for it, listen to NBC intelligence and national security reporter Ken Dilanian, who let the cat out of the bag after last month’s threat. “A security clearance is also very valuable for former officials in [the] private sector. And so, to lose one could amount in a financial penalty,” he explained at the time.

The transcript is below, click "expand" to read: