Ex-acting CIA chief: Foreign countries may 'pause' sharing intel with us

Mike Morell, former acting CIA director during the Obama administration, said Tuesday that foreign countries that share intelligence with the United States might "pause and question whether they should" after President Donald Trump reportedly shared sensitive information with Russian officials.

"Foreign countries share intelligence with the United States regularly, and now they're going to take pause and question whether they should do that if they're afraid the information they're providing could be shared with an adversary of ours and theirs," Morell told "CBS This Morning."


Trump wrote Tuesday morning that he had the right to share information with the Russian government, tweeting: "As President I wanted to share with Russia (at an openly scheduled W.H. meeting) which I have the absolute right to do, facts pertaining to terrorism and airline flight safety. Humanitarian reasons, plus I want Russia to greatly step up their fight against ISIS & terrorism."

The Washington Post reported Monday that at a meeting last week with Russia Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Russia's ambassador to the U.S., Sergey Kislyak, the president shared information on an Islamic State threat so sensitive that it is unknown to many U.S. allies and is tightly controlled even within the confines of the government.

Morell said the intelligence shared is at risk with the Russians.

"The Russians ... will feel the need to investigate the source, try to figure it out, to make sure the source is not also reporting on their activities in Syria," he said. "All of the media coverage now of the source and the facts that are being dug out of where it came from, that's one damage."