House lawmakers were reportedly informed last week that Russia is once again trying to swing the 2020 election toward President Donald Trump—and the president is none too pleased that they found out. One day after the White House announced that Trump loyalist Richard Grenell will become the next acting director of national intelligence, the New York Times reported that the outgoing acting DNI head, Joseph Maguire, got on the president's bad side after allowing his department to inform the House Intelligence Committee about Russia’s intention to help Trump in 2020, which Trump believes Democrats could “weaponize” against him.

Intelligence official Shelby Pierson informed the Intelligence Committee during a February 13 election security briefing about Russia's pro-Trump efforts, saying that Russia had “developed a preference” for the current president while reportedly not describing their specific efforts. The briefing also reportedly included other new revelations, such as that the Russian interference efforts are starting with the Democratic presidential primary, rather than the general election. Republican lawmakers—who, the Times notes, “have long argued that Moscow’s [2016] campaign was designed to sow chaos, not aid Mr. Trump specifically”—were reportedly not thrilled about the suggestion that Russia is trying to help their guy, pushing back and claiming that Trump is “tough on Russia” and could never conceivably be the Kremlin’s White House pick. (Yes, the same Trump who regularly cozies up to Vladimir Putin and allegedly bribed Julian Assange to distance Russia from the Democratic National Committee hack.) “I’d challenge anyone to give me a real-world argument where Putin would rather have President Trump and not Bernie Sanders,” Republican Representative Chris Stewart told the Times when asked about the meeting. Some intelligence officials, the Times reports, viewed the House briefing as a “tactical error” as a result, believing that officials should have “spoken less pointedly or left...out” the suggestion that Russia was biased toward Trump in order to “[avoid] angering the Republicans.”

But the House Republicans’ anger reportedly paled in comparison to Trump, who was furious that the information had been given to Democrats—especially House Intelligence chairman and regular Trump target Adam Schiff. The Times notes that the Trump administration has been especially “reluctan[t] to provide sensitive information” to the longtime Trump critic and prominent impeachment manager, even refusing to invite intelligence committee lawmakers to a briefing on Syria in October solely because Trump didn't want Schiff there. As a result, once the president learned about the House briefing from Rep. Devin Nunes, Trump “erupted at” Maguire during an Oval Office meeting. “There was a dressing down” of Maguire, one source told the Washington Post, and the publication reports Trump perceived Maguire “and his staff as disloyal for speaking to Congress about Russia’s perceived preference.” The DNI chief came away from the meeting “despondent,” said another Post source. Continuing Trump's post-impeachment purge of White House officials he feels to be disloyal, the House briefing was reportedly the “catalyst” that led to Maguire's ouster, destroying his shot at being named the permanent DNI chief—and paving the way for Grenell, the current U.S. ambassador to Germany, to take his role.

Trump is now expected to have a much more sycophantic intelligence chief in Grenell, a former Fox News contributor who's inexperienced when it comes to intelligence—but so devoted to the president that he's even been a Gold level member of the Trump Organization's “Trump Card” loyalty program. And while Grenell's appointment is good news for a president desperate for those around him to stay in line, the new DNI pick doesn't bode well for election security. Current and former intelligence officials told the Times that Grenell may have been named to the position “explicitly to slow the pace of information on election interference to Congress,” keeping Democrats in the dark just as Trump wants. The Trump devotee-turned-intelligence chief may be hesitant to take on a topic that the president, for obvious reasons, isn't particularly keen to tackle, the thinking goes—meaning that information about Russia's 2020 efforts will largely be kept in the hands of the very administration Putin is trying to reelect. “Trump is trying to whitewash or rewrite the narrative about Russia’s involvement in the election,” former intelligence official Andrea Kendall-Taylor, now with the Center for New American Security, told the Times. “Grenell’s appointment suggests he is really serious about that.”

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