Acting DNI Grenell with His First Look at Classified Information
LEMON: Trump loyalist and the new acting DNI Richard Grenell is already marking -- making his mark - excuse me. The New York Times is reporting he is wasting no time requesting the underlying intelligence that led to the assessment that Russia is trying to help Trump. He has access to everything. So, what will he do with the information? Joining me now is Robert Litt. He is a former general counsel for the director of national intelligence. Bob, I appreciate you joining us. Thank you so much.</s>ROBERT LITT, FORMER GENERAL COUNSEL FOR THE DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: Thanks for having me.</s>LEMON: Give me your reaction to Grenell demanding proof of Russian interference.</s>LITT: Well, in the abstract I don't think it's problematic. Which to say that this is the major thing on plate of the intelligence community right now. And it's not at all inappropriate for a new guy coming in to try to understand what the facts. The problem is, is he going to be looking at this from an objective point of view of is he going to be looking at this in an effort to undercut the intelligence community to pass information back to the White House for the purpose of attacking the intelligence community's conclusion.</s>LEMON: Shall we give the benefit of the doubt?</s>LITT: We'll see what happens. I'm always prepared to give everyone the benefit of the doubt.</s>LEMON: We now have an acting director of national intelligence whose main qualification for the job appears to be his loyalty to the president. Do you agree with that, and if so, how does it impact national security?</s>LITT: So, the statute that created the position of director of national intelligence says that the director of national intelligence is supposed to be someone with extensive national security expertise. And there's no way that you can say that Grenell has that. This is a complicated job. It -- we're focused on the issue of providing intelligence to the president. But it involves overseeing the execution of a budget of tens of billions of dollars. It involves setting priorities for intelligence collection and analysis. It involves setting policies for things like information sharing or security clearances. It involves helping understand what kind of overhead satellites we should be using. This is not a job that you can learn on the job. And it's certainly not a job that can be done on a part-time basis while you're also serving as ambassador in Germany.</s>DON LEMON, CNN HOST: So, one of Grenell's first hires was Kash Patel, a former National Security Council official. Former Devin Nunes staffer. Patel played a key role in helping Republicans try to discredit the Russia investigation. Does that move tell you anything about Grenell's priorities?</s>LITT: I mean, look. I don't know Kash Patel him. I think it's a little troubling to have somebody who maybe effectively the number two in the officer of the Director of National Intelligence who spent the last year and more literally tracing around the world trying to undercut the intelligence community. I think, it's going to be very difficult for him to gain the trust of the people who are in the intelligence community with that background.</s>LEMON: Joseph Maguire is actually the one who received the whistleblower complaint on the Ukraine call by did not originally share it with lawmakers. How do you think a loyalist like Grenell would handle a complaint like that?</s>LITT: It's hard to tell. I mean, I think, Maguire handled it appropriately. Remember that the complaint initially went to the inspector general. And so Grenell's ability to suppress the inspector general is somewhat limited. Because inspector general had a degree of independence. So, it's not clear that he would have been able to suppress it any more effectively than the White House was able to do in this case. Which is to say ultimately not at all.</s>LEMON: Well, the question is though, can you do what Devin Nunes ultimately did with the, you know, with the some of the information that regarded the Mueller investigation go back to the White House and then warn them what was happening. So that they get a heads up.</s>LITT: Well, actually the White House did get a heads up in this case anyway, because they called over to the White House because they were concerned about whether this raises -- raised issue of privilege or other concerns. So, the White House actually knew about this complaint before it became public.</s>LEMON: What are you hearing from people inside the intelligence community tonight? Are they concerned about this probe?</s>LITT: I think there's a lot of apprehension. I mean, again, I think, most of them are willing to give Grenell the benefit of the doubt. But he's going to have to earn their trust if he wants to have it. He comes in as we said earlier with no obvious qualifications for the job. Other than the fact that he's personally loyal to the president. The intelligence community prides itself on being non-partisan. On offering unbiased factual analysis to the president. And I'm sure there's a real concern out there that are they going to be pushed to tilt information, to withhold information, to slant the analysis that they're providing so that the president hears what he wants to hear. And I think Grenell is going to have a difficult task to convince the intelligence community that that's not what he's there for.</s>LEMON: And as you said, maybe he will. You said, you're willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. But we shall see. But it's going to be difficult as you said.</s>LITT: We shall be.</s>LEMON: Yes. Thank you, Robert Litt. Bob, thank you so much. I appreciate your time.</s>LITT: Thanks for having me, Don.</s>LEMON: Michael Bloomberg says he'll release three women from their NDA's, but that isn't stopping him from getting slammed on all sides. Should he have seen all this coming?